BAD LUCK BANGING OR LOONY PORN

Winning Golden Bear in Berlin is in no way a guarantee for cinematic excellence, as this unfunny, perplexing and often outright bad Romanian film proves.

If I hadn't already known that Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn had won the Golden Bear at this year's Berlin Film Festival there's no way I would have believed you if you had told me. And yet this Romanian oddity, which starts off with explicit sex scenes and ends on a freeze-frame of a man being orally assaulted by a dildo somehow scooped one of the most prestigious prizes in film.

Chopped up in three ponderously titled chapters the picture opens intriguingly enough - if not exactly riveting - as it transpires that the lead character, a teacher, is desperately trying to get a homemade sex tape of her offline.

But then the film takes a sudden 25-minute detour into an alphabetical series of words and their supposed-to-be-funny explanations, only to sign off on a philosophical segment that sees the teacher put on trial by her peers.

I've seen reviews call Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn audacious and timely. I'd rather stick with unfunny, perplexing and just outright bad, if you don't mind.

release: 2021

director: Radu Jude

starring: Katia Pascariu, Claudia Ieremia, Nicodim Ungureanu, Olimpia Malai