Poppy Field [Câmp de maci] *** (2020, Conrad Mericoffer, Radouan Leflahi, Alexandru Potocean) – Classic Movie Review 12,362

Director Eugen Jebeleanu’s 2020 Romanian drama film Poppy Field [Câmp de maci] follows the Jekyll and Hyde struggle of young Romanian gendarme Cristi (Conrad Mericoffer) to live his personal life as a closeted gay man and his working life in the macho, homophobic hierarchical environment of the Romanian military police force. A curious, impactful short feature, inspired by true events. it is more complex and challenging than it perhaps seems at first sight, and more than repays a second look.

While his long-distance French Muslim boyfriend Hadi (Radouan Leflahi) is visiting him for the weekend, Cristi is sent with his unit to disperse a group of nationalistic, homophobic protestors who have taken to the stage and blocked the screening of a lesbian film at a Bucharest cinema. Cristi sees a former fling in the crowd of the protesters, who threatens to out him, and Cristi lashes out violently. The heart of the film is Cristi interacting with other officers keeping him away from the crowd and the man he hit.

An odd mix of being talky, small-scale and uneventful on the one hand, and being intense, taut, passionate, suspenseful on the other, Poppy Field works surprisingly effectively. It motors effectively on the idea of impending doom, that something just terrible is about to happen. Something bad does happen, but it’s hard to gauge just how terrible it is. The moody, violent, extremely flawed ‘hero’ is to sympathise with. He’s a rather nasty, unpleasant piece of work, actually. But that’s not really the point, as he is a victim of self-loathing and society’s hatred, which is the point, and Conrad Mericoffer plays him very successfully. It is economically shot in just a couple of locations, representing the two sides of the cop’s life.

It could perhaps be said that there is a lack of action and that the first sequence with love making with the Muslim boyfriend and the sudden unexpected arrival of the cop’s sister seems to belong to another film, and that at the very least it needed to be picked up again at the conclusion, but it just fizzles out, unexplained. Nevertheless, it puts Cristi’s life in context and sharp focus, and proposes the possibility of a happier, freer, more liberated, honest life. The boyfriend Hadi represents a free, happy life, as he seems free, happy and loving, wanting to drive out with Cristi and see the world, but Cristi doesn’t dare go outside together with Hadi, and gets evasive and nasty when it’s suggested.

And so, a closeted gay policeman’s lot is not a happy one, but then we probably knew that already.

Writer Ioana Moraru.

First film by the actor Eugen Jebeleanu.

© Derek Winnert 2022 Classic Movie Review 12,362

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