4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
Written by Andreas Babiolakis
This review is a part of the Palme d’Or Project: a review of every single Palme d’Or winner at Cannes Film Festival. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days won the fifty second Palme d’Or at the 2007 festival.
The film was selected by the following jury.
Jury President: Stephen Frears.
Jury: Marco Bellocchio, Maggie Cheung, Toni Collette, Maria de Medeiros, Orhan Pamuk, Michel Piccoli, Sarah Polley, Abderrahmane Sissako.
I hate – nay, despise – that I have to reflect on the overturning of Roe v. Wade at all, but we live in confusing, dark times. The case provided safety for women to protect themselves from a number of concerns. Also, at the end of the day, women should be able to have control over their own bodies. I should not have to point to a film like 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days as a film that "tells us so" when it comes to the dangers and issues surrounding illegal abortions, but here we are. Apparently the powers that be can't figure it the fuck out. Set in Communist Romania in 1987, Cristian Mungiu's magnificently grim film was meant to be a reminder as to why we cannot go the ways of old with some things, and yet here we are. Women of all ages are threatened worldwide with this change, likely because of the possible snowball effect it will begin. Hell, many women across the world already cannot have legal abortions. We are supposed to be moving forwards. Supposed to be.
Gabriela and Otilia are two university students that are preparing for an abortion for the former. Given the era, their age and circumstances, the girls nervously try to go about this without being caught. The way that Mungiu films this story is with so many deep hues surrounding a barebones story, as if we can feel the dread of a straight forward narrative and anticipate the worst. Well, the film takes no time zipping straight to its grimmest version of itself, as to capture the extremities that women have to go through in order to make these choices. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days gives an entire list of things that can go wrong because abortions are illegal, and they all happen within such a short time frame. A standard, approved procedure would secure women.
4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days is relentlessly heavy, but it needs to be when it comes to such a concerning subject matter.
The person carrying out the abortion is a man: Mr. Bebe. Having an awful male here is the accurate symbol that Mungiu was hoping it would be, particularly because of how this horrendous character sexualizes and abuses the women that are entrusting him for help. The film is willing to get into the heaviest territories to prove a point: no one should put themselves so deeply into harm's way over something dealing with their own bodies. In the same way that pro-lifers want to champion people being able to have meaningful lives, they neglect to see how dangerous – or even fatal – restricting women from having much needed abortions can be. Additionally, much of what is bad in 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days is through choice, as if the evil people in the film have more freedom than the two lead girls; almost every time, these bad seeds choose selfishly.
This is honestly one of the hardest films of the twenty first century to watch, but this is a hyper real scenario for millions of women across the world. How far someone has to go in order to protect themselves is quite astonishing. The title is how far along Gabriela is, but the day that we see in the film feels just as long. Trauma and pain can be endless. Nobody chooses abortion because it's convenient or fun. It's a tough enough scenario. Take away the choice to have an abortion legally, and you run into the wrong people, hiked up prices likely for those that can't afford them, seedy areas, harmful conditions, and so many other concerns that 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days can't even begin to get into. It only shows a little of what can happen, but it's enough to make Mungiu's point.
No one technically wins or has a happy ending in 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, but that’s precisely the point.
The film concludes with a difficult realization that a child isn't brought into a world this hateful and awful. The act of giving birth is meant to be a positive one: the introduction of a new soul brought into existence, bonded with, and made into a member of the society of Earth. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days doesn't deny that there is joy in having a child and in life itself, but it specifically acknowledges that there is a hell of a lot of bad circling around, too. In a film that is heavily pro choice, there's an argument that most of us adults are void of life. That spark is long gone. You as a viewer won't find any love here at all, but that's kind of the point. There's nothing happy about the sacrifice of one's self because of the backwards ways of society that do not have those affected in mind. The film is specifically about abortion, but it is applicable to so many similarly constricting legislations. 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days is a masterwork of tragedy and the monstrosities of uncaring politics: a film that will anger, depress, or frighten you. However you feel at the film's end, you will certainly finish watching a changed person.
Andreas Babiolakis has a Masters degree in Film and Photography Preservation and Collections Management from Toronto Metropolitan University, as well as a Bachelors degree in Cinema Studies from York University. His favourite times of year are the Criterion Collection flash sales and the annual Toronto International Film Festival.