CABBAGE, POTATOES AND OTHER DEMONS
a film by Șerban Georgescu
1 village, 1.000 tractors, 100.000 tons of cabbages & potatoes each year,
which are hardly sold and eventually destroyed. Is there any way out?
“This project is great. This is a story where you take an everyday subject and get the
whole picture of the absurdities in agriculture financing within Europe.”
(OLAF GRUNERT, Commissioning Editor, ARTE)
“I like it very much. I think it is a very actual movie and with a high market potential.”
(BRANKO LUSTIG, Double Oscar winning producer of Schindler's List, Gladiator)
Synopsis
In the Romanian village of Lunguletu, 1000 farmers on their tractors sit on
100.000 tons of cabbage in the local market, waiting for customers. At the end
of the day they either sell for nothing or destroy their crops.
Intrigued of getting 1 ton of cabbage for just EUR 20 townie Serban decides to
spend one year in the village and work the land, to see why these people got
into a deadlock and if there is any way out. The Mayor and some villagers have
ideas and possible solutions. But can they overcome the farmers mistrusting
each other, their fear of a “collective farm” and the powerful urge to compete?
A satire of current realities in agriculture Europe narrated by the director himself,
the film will tell from the inside and in a self-ironical tone the story of a village
that got stuck in between past and present.
Trailer @Vimeo
facebook.com/CabbagePotatoesDemons
Team
Director & Writer
Producer
Co-Producer
Associate Producer
Executive Producer
Cinematography
Editor
Sound recording
Sound mixing
Original soundtrack
Graphics & Design
Script consultant
Translation
Production
Co-production
Broadcasters
Co-funders
International Distribution
Romanian Distribution
Șerban Georgescu
Alex Iordăchescu
Șerban Georgescu
Heino Deckert
Daniel Burlac
Oana Muntean
Bogdan Slăvescu
Șerban Georgescu
Alex Iosub
Marian Iacoban
Vlad Blîndu
Rasterpoint
Alex Alexandru
Ana Boariu
Adriana Hoancă
Elefant Film (RO)
Kolectiv (RO)
Ma.ja.de. Filmproduktion (DE)
MDR/Arte
TVR Romania
TV Estonia
Creative Europe Media Programme
Centrul Național al Cinematografiei România
Deckert Distribution
Ultraviolet Media
Technical details
Format/
Platforms
DCP, Full HD
Stereo Sound
Length
60 min
Genre
Documentary | Social Issues
Release Date
Spring 2016
Language
Romanian, with English subtitles
TV version Dubbed in German, French
A documentary developed through Documentary Campus Masterschool 2013
Extended Synopsis
Lunguletu is a village with statistics well worth of the Guinness Book of Records. In a community
of 5,000 people there are almost 1,000 tractors, as almost each family in the village has
bought their own. The village produces some 5% of the annual potato and 10% of the annual
cabbage production of the whole country. Most of it gets buried.
I, Serban, the director, follow the story of the villagers of Lunguletu for one year in an attempt
to understand why these peasants’ families, apparently prosperous and with high chances to
a good life, live in debt.
Year after year each family plants potatoes they try to sell. They need the money to plant
cabbage. Which they try to sell, because they need the money to plant potatoes. Apparently
easy: they produce and want to sell. But none of them ventures too far. They all stay put and
simply wait for the clients.
During the communist regime, they were the heroes off the communist agriculture. Somebody
always told them what to do, how to do and how much. Today, they have the liberty to do
whatever they want, but this poses the biggest problems. Who can they blame, if they fail?
Accepted by the community, I slowly get to know the villagers and their problems. I am
wondering why the villagers don’t make an association to look for funds together, to build a
storage house, to find a distributor for the whole production.
I decide to work the land and produce my own ton of cabbage. Before autumn, I am as
excited as they are: will the cabbage be sold this year? Can our plans work?
During one year, I will unveil the absurdity of these transition-triggered situations where the
Romanian peasants are aiming to become European peasants, however without being able
to understand the mechanisms that could lead them to a successful business, even while
they toil to cultivate their land.
The documentary is essentially a film about people’s inability to break out of a vicious circle,
presented on a specifically Romanian note – the iconic way of laughing your way out of your
troubles.
The whole film is built as seen through the eyes of the subjective narrator: I, Serban, who sees
everything and tells the whole story from the inside. The film uses voiceover and the interviews
are not realized in a classical manner. The characters do not speak to the camera, but discuss
with me, as I am looking for answers directly from the people living here. To make the story
even more engaging and trustworthy, I get actively involved in the community life, by working
hard together with the villagers, as an “embedded journalist”.
The documentary advances at a rapid pace. The tone is cheerful and optimistic, depicting a
village full of diligent and ambitious people. Though irony is constantly present, it never falls
into criticism or mockery. This is not a cold report on the realities of agriculture, but a warm
close-up, presented through my personal lens.
Șerban Georgescu
Șerban Georgescu has more than 20 years of
experience in documentaries and advertising as
an editor, producer and director.
His personal projects include his coverage as
cameraman and director of the documentary
Everest, the Calator pe Viata, adventure and
culture TV series that he filmed and directed
himself, or ROST / SENSE short documentary.
As editor he collaborated with some of the best
documentary directors in Romania, among
which Ovidiu Bose-Paștina, Alexandru Solomon
or Ana Boariu.
He has teamed up with Norwegian director &
producer David Kinsella for several international
award-winning documentaries.
FILMOGRAPHY, Selected
ROST (Sense) / 2014
SENSE is direction, meaning, destiny. Sense means good practice and a certain way of being. Identity begins with understanding your own sense into the world. When you no longer
have it, you get lost. The film gathers a number of elements depicting Romanian sense, from
tastes to colors, faces and customs. Stories about things from the old days, well done and
very Romanian. Because there’s SENSE in what we do. And we will keep it.
BUCĂTĂRIA HOINARĂ (Wanders of Cooking) / 2011
Appetite comes with... shooting! A scrumptious journey among people, places and ingredients, based on a recipe where wanderlust and the zest of life thrive in a most harmonious
combination. Four cooks, each one with their own story and their own quirks and twists,
travel across Romania.
CĂLĂTOR PE VIAŢĂ (A Traveller for Life) / 2009-2011
A series of culture and adventure traveling to some of the most extreme regions of the planet, from the Amazon jungle to the Arctic glaciers, from Africa to Tibet and from the desert of
Sahara to Mount Everest, showing not only landscapes, but also people, culture, history and
life.
ȚARA LĂPUȘULUI – DESTINE ÎNCRUSTATE (Lapus County – Carved Destinies) / 2010
From time to time, we discover a place where we can forget the passage of time. Lapus
is one of these places, a place where everything you set your eyes on ceases to be fleeting and stays with you longer. A travel to this county helps you get accustomed to another
rhythm; to linger, to understand, to reach deeply into the texture of color, of folds, of the raw
earth, of silences.
EVEREST / 2003
A film about the first 100% Romanian expedition on Mount Everest. A film about courage,
friendship, failure and triumph. An expedition that for the first time – although disputed by
some and acclaimed by others – brought the Romanian flag up there, on the highest mountain of the world.
Director's Statement
Hello, my name is Serban Georgescu. People know me best as the cameraman and director of the documentary following the first Romanian expedition on Mount Everest. But I have
started to work in the broadcasting industry 20 years ago, as a video editor. And now I am
excited about my new film: “Cabbage, Potatoes and Other Demons”.
During my trips across Romania, I have often crossed the fields of this village, a place that
has always fascinated me with the working frenzy of its people and the madness of its wide
oceans and high mountains of cabbage and potatoes. I have often said that such things
deserved to be presented in a film, and now the time has come for such a project. First and
foremost, because the visual elements are unbelievable, but also because the people of this
village have an amazing story. They have been cultivating potatoes and cabbage for the
past 200 years – and only recently have started wondering why they reached a deadlock.
On a positive tone, the story of this single village becomes a relevant subject for a wide
audience across the world. By discussing the struggles and challenges of small farmers,
it approaches a lot of different important topics in our society: mentalities, different sets of
values, stereotypes, modern migrations.
I was encouraged in my endeavor by Branko Lustig, Double Oscar winning producer of
Schindler's List and Gladiator, who commented on the film after a test pitch: “I like it very
much. I think it is a very actual movie, with a high market potential.”
The film has been developed through the Documentary Campus Masterschool mentoring
program, benefitting of the support of an experienced network of industry experts.
For the production I teamed up with highly recognized partners such as Heino Deckert,
Ma.ja.de Filmproduktion (Germany), Alex Iordachescu, Elefant Films (Romanian / Switzerland) and Dan Burlac (Romania / France).
Our main financial partners are MDR/ARTE, CNC - Romanian National Centre for
Cinematography, TVR - Romanian Public Television and EU's Creative Europe MEDIA
Program.
SYNOPSIS
Elefant Film
Unmarried Mara has mysteriously fallen pregnant. This poses a problem for her
fellow residents of the small fishing village on the Danube delta, where Europe’s
second longest river enters the Black Sea, and religion mixes with superstition like
earth with water. Expelled from her village, Mara finds employment at the nearby
spa hotel Tekir where infertile women are treated with the sacred Danube mud.
When her world collides with that of the well-to-do, eccentric cosmopolitan Lili,
magic combines with power and tradition with modernity to become the answer
to Lili’s desire to have children – and Mara’s ‘immaculate’ conception.
Elefant Flms is a fim production company founded in 2004 by Alex Iordăchescu and
Ruxandra Zenide. They created this company in order to produce and co- produce
independent films (fiction and documentary feature films, short films and experimental
films).
The company has developed a network of international partners that work together on
co-productions of the Swiss film industry and other European countries.
Elefant Films is a full accredited member of GARP (The Group of the Producers Filmmakers)
since 2005 and part of its board of directors since 2006. Some of the films produced in the
past years are: The miracle of Tekir (d: Ruxandra Zenide, 2015), Le Mur et l’Eau (d: Alice
Fargier, 2014), Sette opere di misericordia (d: Gianluca De Serio, Massimilliano De Serio,
2012), Lullaby to my father (d: Amos Gitai, 2012), Păcătoasa Teodora (d: Anca Hirte, 2011),
L’enfance d’Icare (d: Alex Iordăchescu, 2009), L’Autre Moitié (d: Rolando Colla, 2007), Ryna
(d: Ruxandra Zenide, 2005).
Elefant Film SRL
Calea Mosilor 123, apt. 4bis, sector 2, Bucuresti
tel: +40723.889.169
e-mail: [email protected]