2018 | 99 minutes
Paul Negoescu
A bittersweet romantic comedy in the tradition of Italian ironist Nanni Moretti and the neuroses-fuelled early works of Woody Allen, The Story of A Summer Lover is the third feature by acclaimed writer-director Paul Negoescu, whose previous award-winning films have appeared at the Cannes, Berlin, Rotterdam, and Venice. This latest film revolves around Petru, a feckless forty-something professor of mathematics at the Polytechnic University of Bucharest, a man who leads a carefree life. Rather smug and self-satisfied, he brags to his friends that he lives in an open relationship with his partner, Irina, who overlooks that Petru occasionally has affairs with other women. He gets the shock of his middle-aged life when Irina not only announces that she is pregnant, but that she’s leaving him. Reeling from this double whammy, Petru is forced to change his lifestyle and grow up. But is he even capable of that? And will his friends be of help, or will they make the situation worse? A wry tale of male inadequacy, Story is an incisive and amusing assessment of modern relationships.