Sports documentaries are the rave, aren’t they? It’s good then that there are so many stories to tell and still people around to tell them, whether they play for a Welsh football club or they embedded themselves in a country’s collective memory.
The 1994 World Cup was a big thing for Romania. Not just for the football watching part of the country, but for pretty much everyone. It was the first time the country really took center stage in a positive way after the 1989 Revolution. The national team’s performance had a wide ranging impact. And it has since become a footballing reference point we look back upon with affection and melancholy.
This is not director Claudiu Mitcu’s first foray into the genre or the theme. In 2009 he helmed a film (uninventively) titled “Australia”, about Romania’s participation at the football Homeless World Cup. I wrote some kind words at the time, but since then, Mitcu has primarily been known as a producer for (primarily) Romanian documentaries, including Pentru mine tu eşti Ceauşescu (2021) and De ce mă cheamă Nora, când cerul meu e senin (2023).
Returning with Hai Romania! as a director to a story he undoubtedly holds dear yields good results and the documentary does well to catch some of the atmosphere and feelings of the times. Featuring many of the protagonists, from Hagi to Popescu to Iordănescu, we are accompanied through the years leading up to the 1994 WC and then the event itself. Even if the approach is less structured than I would have liked, it’s hard not to get a sense of the emotions involved.
With the advantage of time passing on its side, the documentary coaxes more intimate introspection and revelation from those involved. This is something that usually eludes modern day sports documentaries, with active athletes loathe to say anything controversial. Florin Răduciou, the charismatic striker, is probably the most effective storyteller, entertaining, revealing and also emotional. Yet, there’s a sense of honest rumination for most participants. Even moreso, there is a sense of strongly lingering “what if” – with manager Iordănescu perhaps the most self critical of all. Which is just the nature of football, as hindsight always makes for the best teacher.
What drags the movie down other than the loose structure is the inclusion of too many talking heads. Not sure if it could have been better to focus on a few storytellers, as the wide spread isn’t very impactful. That aside though, there’s definitely no justification in including some of the most controversial figures of 90s Romanian football for colour commentary – impresario Giovanni Becali and former Football Federation President Mircea Sandu. Both should be bearing the cross for the dilapidation of Romanian football, not proffering their romanticized reminisces.
I would have also liked more of a parallel with the state of Romanian society, a deeper look into what it really meant at that time for people in the country. As it stands, the movie doesn’t aim to do more than highlight the elation of victories. It also curtails the latter part of the golden generation’s adventure, shying away from the complicated feelings this came with, the endless comparisons of later day Romanian footballers to “the golden era”, as well as the wider impact many of the generation’s protagonists have since had on the evolution (or not) of the sport within the country. The story admits a narrower scope, playing like an ode, more than an analysis.
I have no idea how this documentary hits for those who haven’t lived the times. It seems to assume a lot of prior knowledge. The cinema I went to was completely empty on opening day, hinting that the alienation modern day Romanian football fans feel has even seeped into our memories. That said, I do hope it finds its audience, because those times will be tough to recreate – if not impossible seeing how the gaps in sport are ever increasing between those with access to resources and those without.
tributary stu 