If you like your comedy bold and bawdy, with a bite of social/political critique, Radu Jude’s Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn is the film for you. I enjoyed it immensely. In my review of Jude’s 2018 film I Do Not Care if We Go Down in History as Barbarians, I wrote that the film has an “intentionally jarring opening.” Jude appears to be a filmmaker with a penchant for thought-provoking openings, as this, his latest film, opens with an explicit sex scene. The sex appears to be mutually pleasurable, and even family centered, as in mid-session there is a brief conversation between the woman and someone outside the room (perhaps a grandmother) about the importance of sanitizing toys before the child of the family plays with them. Radu shot the film during the current pandemic, and while it is not about COVID 19, the pandemic and its consequences are always in the background.
As it turns out, the woman in question is Emi (Katia Pascariu), a schoolteacher, and the video has somehow circulated extensively online. Irate parents have insisted on an emergency meeting, and Emi is on her way. With an abrupt shift in style, the film now follows Emi, dressed in a subdued gray suit, as she walks through the streets of Bucharest. There is a documentary feel to this part as the camera takes in signs of globalism, the damage wrought by the pandemic, and a climate of anger and violence simmering just beneath the surface; as well as the way life goes on, like a flower growing through a crack in the sidewalk.
Then the film shifts again, presenting a “dictionary of anecdotes, signs, and wonders.” Note to viewers, the dictionary is of course in alphabetical order in Romanian, but the subtitles convey the meaning. Incisive critique flashes by almost too fast to comprehend, calling out racism, sexism, fascism and complicity in the Holocaust; themes that the director has engaged with in past films. It’s riveting, occasionally funny, and often horrifying. Let’s circle back mentally to the film’s opening scene – graphic sex is considered shocking enough that I felt I ought to warn readers. What about the violence (hatred, corruption, lies) that permeates our lives and screens? That requires no warning, as we have become so accustomed to it.
Once that visually and intellectually intense layer of meaning has penetrated the viewer’s consciousness, the film returns to Emi’s plight. It is in this final chapter that one comes to know the character a bit better, as she confronts the masked and socially distanced parents in a scene that verges on the surreal as it unmasks the hypocrisy, voyeurism and prejudice of Emi’s accusers. It is also hilariously funny. Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn was awarded The Golden Bear at the 2021 Berlin Film Festival.
* This review was originally posted in the context of the Jerusalem International Film Festival 2021.
