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Review

Staff Review: A lonely, 62-year-old man with an apartment full of cats wakes up with a terrible headache. After a while his stomach hurts as well, so he calls an ambulance. This being Romania, the wait could be hours. While he waits (and we wait with him), Mr. Lazarescu asks his brusque neighbors for some painkillers; they wait with him, then call again for an ambulance as the old man starts spitting up blood. This is the cheery set-up for a horrific tour through the Rumanian health care system. Shot almost in real time -- and clocking in at over 2 1/2 hours -- this is certainly not everyone's cup of tea. It's inherently depressing, with the majority of the doctors and nurses treating Mr. L. with cruelty (almost to a one, they insult and demean the man about his drinking. Death is surely filled with the most anti-alcohol cast of characters in recent memory). A sympathetic but frazzled paramedic accompanies the old man as he's shuffled from hospital to hospital, traveling through his several levels of Hell (Lazarescu's first name being Dante is hardly an accident); his first doctor calls him a pig and dismisses him, at the second hospital, he's unable to get the Cat Scan he so desperately needs because the ER is overflowing with the victims of a traffic accident, and so on.

Death has been marketed as a dark comedy, but it's difficult to see where the yuks are; it's brutal and uncompromising, and certainly has moments of irony and absurdism, but a comedy? Regardless, everyone on the cast and crew should be commended for the incredibly real, believable tone and atmosphere: there are many scenes that recall the best work of fly-on-the-wall documentarian Frederick Wiseman, and that's saying something. As a look at a very specific sector of society (Wiseman's usual milieu), Death pulls absolutely no punches and is unsentimental yet fair. The sometimes unbearably cruel attitude of several of the doctors is tempered with the helpfulness of others; we can even see -- without being hit over the head -- why the more vicious physicians have become so bitter and burned-out. They see people like Dante every day -- those who take awful care of themselves their whole lives, and then expect the doctors to fix them up (this doesn't remotely excuse their behavior, but this -- and the unbelievable stress of their jobs -- helps explain it).

Admittedly a tough sell -- and for God's sake, don't watch it with a date -- Death is still highly recommended for hardy, adventurous viewers. Just make sure to have some Three Stooges or a buoyant musical ready to go afterwards.

 -- Dean C. Galanis