The young Romanian director Cristian Nemescu was killed shortly after completing this tragicomedy set during the conflict in Bosnia. His death was a double tragedy; the loss of a young life, (he was only 27), to be sure and the loss of a potentially major talent in international cinema. However, despite it's setting "California Dreamin'" isn't so much a comedy of war but a biting satire on bourgeoisie attitudes in a country struggling to make itself heard. It may not be quite in the same class as some of Milos Forman's early Czech films, though on occasion it does come close, and there were times when I was reminded of Jiri Menzel's similarly set "Closely Observed Trains". The plot revolves around a group of US soldiers, part of NATO, caught between a group of striking villagers and the corrupt station-master who refuses to let their train pass through his station and it is apparently based on fact. Nemescu manages to poke gentle fun at all sides; no-one finally emerges intact with both the Americans and the Romanians coming off equally badly and he does a wonderful job in evoking the boredom of village life. The performances throughout are superb with perhaps Ion Sapdaru as the mayor and Razvan Vasilescu as the station-master the standouts. Those icons of both American and Romanian culture, Elvis and Dracula, also make an appearance.

It's a very touching film, funny and beautiful in his simplicity! You can be sad or smiling? You can be introspective? You can be with the the actors in this movie? Every spectator can be in one character of this film, you can laugh and be critical in the same time... but you cannot be upset for losing time to watch this film!And in the ultimate instance, to be more understanding for this film must to be Romanian!Respect for the director who are not longer under us...______________________________________________http://octogonul.ro

I have had the chance to watch this movie three times over the past two weeks due to certain circumstances, and even though I imagined what most of the comments here on IMDb would read, I was still surprised to read them as well as to see the rating that this movie has received from the voters.The story of the movie is interesting, and drives the movie forward for some time, which is a definite improvement compared to most other Romanian movies. Sadly, however, the movie does not, in my view at any rate, make as much use of the story as it could have. I realize the movie is unfinished but I somehow doubt that rewriting the entire script was part of the filmmakers' plans.Other positive aspects of the movie are the reasonably good use of flashbacks, the remarkably good sound quality compared to every other Romanian movie ever made, and the acting from one or two of the actors.Where negative aspects are concerned, however, I fear the list is far longer: The screenplay was one of the worst parts of this movie. Some of the dilogue is horribly unrealistic and literally cringeworthy. Someone on the IMDb boards was saying that all the characters are meant to be stereotypes (save Doiaru), which is all fine, but creating a stereotypical character is not incompatible with dialgoue that is not boring, artificial drivel.The acting from everyone involved except Alexandru Margineanu and Ion Sapdaru was atrocious. Armand Assante delivers each sentence to his men as though he was sending them into battle against impossible odds, with the fate of humanity at stake.Overlooking some "plot holes" because it is my understanding this movie is based on true events (though I'm not sure to which extent), I find that the movie becomes very boring, very quickly.The soundtrack was practically inexistent. 8 songs for a 155 minute runtime is pathetic. There was virtually no ambiance music at any time during the movie, it was mostly just street sounds and the sounds made by various objects. Scenes in movies like "No Country For Old Men" are able to utilize this properly and to great effect. This movie, and "4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days" are not.The hand-held camera "effect" employed but seemingly every Romanian moviemaker is becoming old. I get that you can be artsy, great, but can you be refined? The list could go on but I feel it is unnecessary. I just have to say I was disappointed by this movie, as I had pretty high expectations (no, I was not expecting an Oscar-winning movie, and my expectations were definitely in tune with what Romanian movie-making is capable of).It was very sad to see the movie exploiting a known formula for good reviews and perhaps an award or two - politically involved plot + movie revealing all the negative aspects of Romania + exploiting the political circumstances = movie with great reviews that "tells it like it is".I was very sorry to hear about the death of the director, however I found it very distasteful to inform the audience of his death at the beginning of the movie, in what was clearly an attempt to gain the sympathy of the viewers. If they really wanted to account for the fact that the movie was unfinished, they could have said it at the end, so as not to have people watching the whole movie thinking of how sad it was that he died.Overall, I rate this movie a 5/10, for all the reasons stated above, and find it to be a step up from a lot of other Romanian movies out there (of which I consider Filantropica to be one of the best if not the single best).

All of us, when tired, look for an easy and full of fun or action movie in a Hollywood style. However, once in a while, sooner rather than later, is not bad watching a movie that makes us use a little our brain in conjunction with our emotions. California Dreamin' is such a movie. First of all, you must take into account that this movie was not post-processed almost at all due to the tragically death of its director. It is useless to think how it would have been looked if it was finished by Nemescu. We have to look at it as it is. Even like this, movie was brilliantly directed making me remember of Antonioni's Blow-Out. Lots of people would not like it because it shows too much poverty or does not show all aspects of Balkan's life or just because is not a Hollywood movie. Let's be straight, no movie gives you a panorama about a region's life, for this you should watch News or read magazines. Movies give you a vision built by a group of people starting with the screenwriter and ending with its director. You may agree with it or not but this is not important. Important is if after a while it makes you think and if it does the movie was not useless. Others didn't like the movie being ambiguous but they forget that this is an art movie which is not giving you solutions, but based on presented facts you have to find the answers by yourself and no wonder if each person will find different conclusions because after all we are different from each other. Or this is the greatest merit of this movie: makes you think about a lot of things among which why life is so hard when can be easier. Obviously this movie was a hard option for Nemescu but eventually because of this option it is his postmortem triumph. In the end, this movie is not an image of Balkans but an image which can be applied to 80% of this world. The feelings and emotions included in it can be applied to 100% of this world. It is tragic Nemescu died after his first movie, but it is fortunate he left as legacy such a movie rather than a regular "big hit".