Milk Teeth

What begins as a typical day of chores and playtime for 10-year-old Maria (Emma Ioana Mogoş) darkens when she becomes the last person to see her older sister Alina. On a simple trip through her courtyard to empty the trash bins, Alina disappears suddenly and quietly, leaving Maria and her bewildered parents to navigate a broken justice system with no clues and no assistance.

While her mother (Marina Palii) loses her grip on the day-to-day and her father (Igor Babiac) loses his hope, Maria takes matters into her own hands, determined to find her sister. As Maria’s investigation begins taking a toll on her own mind, and her family continues slipping through the cracks, the auspicious political revolution dawning in Romania acts as a backdrop for their own personal nightmare.

This devastating second solo fiction feature from director Mihai Mincan bridges the external with the family’s tragedy to articulate the personal cost of a changing political system. Inspired by a real case from the time of the fall of dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu’s Romania, Alina’s disappearance is made all the more horrifying by Mincan’s slinking camera, obscuring the space as if it itself contained clues.

With the futility of the state-run investigation laid bare, Mogoş’ Maria is powerful in her assured stillness. Encountering the fallibility of the grown-ups around her and navigating her own coming of age in the wake of what has happened, her world view steadily spoils and simple acts take on strong new meanings. The events of that terrible day loom over everything, and Maria becomes a representative of a whole generation of children who fell through the cracks.

DOROTA LECH