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Police, Adjective
Hank Sartin reviews Police, Adjective.
Tailing a suspect may be suspenseful in cop thrillers, but don’t we all sense that in reality most detective work of this kind is incredibly dull, especially if the crime seems petty and not worth prosecuting? That, we learn, is the problem faced by young Romanian cop Cristi (Bucur). He’s tailing a teenager who a snitch has claimed is dealing drugs, but all Cristi can see is that the teen is smoking some dope with friends. Cristi speculates that the snitch might just be trying to get the suspect out of the way to move in on his girlfriend. Worse, Cristi has seen how much more relaxed drug-possession laws are outside Romania, and he doesn’t want to arrest the teen at all.
These bits of information emerge at an exquisitely slow pace, hidden among conversations about grammar (Cristi’s wife is a teacher), city nicknames and symbolism in a pop song. In long takes of scenes with little action, Porumboiu builds a weird kind of suspense as we wait for the movie to tell us just what the hell it’s about. For some, that may be infuriating, but we found it hypnotic. It all builds to an incredible scene in which Cristi and his boss discuss morality and the role of police in civil society. Not exactly the gun battle of a conventional climax, but exciting nonetheless.
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