"Collective," after last year's "Honeyland" (2019), is only the second picture to be nominated for both Best International Feature Film and Best Documentary Feature, and while both are striking in different ways, I thought both suffered from muddled, over-expansive narratives. This one covers outrageous political and public-health scandals in Romania. Interesting and even infuriating as it all is, the result is messy and overlong.
At the bookends of the picture, there's the grieving father of a son who died after a fire at the nightclub Colectiv in Bucharest, which lacked fire exits, and compounded by the Hexi Pharma fraud of diluted disinfectants in hospitals and bribery and general incompetence and cruelty involving hospital management--resulting in burn victims dying from infection and even being covered in maggots. The first part of the plot mostly follows a sports newspaper, of all media, who uncover much of this maleficence. This journalistic documentary take à la "All the President's Men" (1976) (or "Spotlight" (2015), for the younger reader) leads to the resignation of the nation's health minister, as well as the rest of the government, we're told, whereupon "Collective" refocuses mostly on the investigative and reform efforts of the new, technocratic minister and his subsequent losing of his job when the Social Democratic party regain control of the government after winning an election on a populist platform (by the way, as of this writing, he's back at the post). There's also a subplot involving a burn victim who models for a photographic exhibition.
Another comparison that comes to my mind is what I think the best documentary, at least from the U. S., of the season about a political and healthcare scandal, "Totally Under Control" (2020). Although I like the fly-on-the-wall observational approach of "Collective," the talking heads and TV clips of its American counterpart help to keep the focus on the political corruption and incompetence of its healthcare issue of the pandemic. Much of the observation of the Sports newspaper's work could've been cut here, especially the speculation at their meetings and their commentary regarding the supposed guilty appearance of the subjects they photograph from afar. Additionally, I like the reflexivity of the photographic exhibition here, but its veering towards fetishizing or sexualizing of the woman's scarring seems somewhat out of place. Compare that to the camera turning on itself in "Totally Under Control," which supports its pandemic narrative by exposing the precautions taken for filmmaking during this health crisis. Nevertheless, the subject matter and observational approach of "Collective" is so strong, that I'm still glad I saw it.
At the bookends of the picture, there's the grieving father of a son who died after a fire at the nightclub Colectiv in Bucharest, which lacked fire exits, and compounded by the Hexi Pharma fraud of diluted disinfectants in hospitals and bribery and general incompetence and cruelty involving hospital management--resulting in burn victims dying from infection and even being covered in maggots. The first part of the plot mostly follows a sports newspaper, of all media, who uncover much of this maleficence. This journalistic documentary take à la "All the President's Men" (1976) (or "Spotlight" (2015), for the younger reader) leads to the resignation of the nation's health minister, as well as the rest of the government, we're told, whereupon "Collective" refocuses mostly on the investigative and reform efforts of the new, technocratic minister and his subsequent losing of his job when the Social Democratic party regain control of the government after winning an election on a populist platform (by the way, as of this writing, he's back at the post). There's also a subplot involving a burn victim who models for a photographic exhibition.
Another comparison that comes to my mind is what I think the best documentary, at least from the U. S., of the season about a political and healthcare scandal, "Totally Under Control" (2020). Although I like the fly-on-the-wall observational approach of "Collective," the talking heads and TV clips of its American counterpart help to keep the focus on the political corruption and incompetence of its healthcare issue of the pandemic. Much of the observation of the Sports newspaper's work could've been cut here, especially the speculation at their meetings and their commentary regarding the supposed guilty appearance of the subjects they photograph from afar. Additionally, I like the reflexivity of the photographic exhibition here, but its veering towards fetishizing or sexualizing of the woman's scarring seems somewhat out of place. Compare that to the camera turning on itself in "Totally Under Control," which supports its pandemic narrative by exposing the precautions taken for filmmaking during this health crisis. Nevertheless, the subject matter and observational approach of "Collective" is so strong, that I'm still glad I saw it.