Would you swallow gold for your family? This miner does. Daily.
Jacob (Dorel Visan) is a gold miner who risks his life daily to support his wife, mother-in-law, and four children in this socio-political drama. Under the rule of an oppressive monarchy backed by military force, the miners often resort to stealing gold to compensate for their meager wages. Workers are subjected to strip searches and are forced to take laxatives by the often brutal guards and inspectors as they look for stolen gold, and Jacob raises his vocal objections over the treatment of his fellow workers.
Acting
Dorel Vișan's volcanic restraint — erupts without exploding.
Direction
Daneliuc's unflinching gaze at bodily humiliation as politics.
Cinematography
Suffocating close-ups in claustrophobic mine shafts.
Director
Mircea Daneliuc
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Made during Ceaușescu's final years, the film miraculously slipped past censors who missed its allegorical bite.
Real miners played extras; some had actually swallowed gold to survive, bringing documentary weight to the fiction.
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