Could Acclaimed Family Drama ‘Fjord’ Be Seen as Too MAGA for Awards Season Glory?

A little more than three months ago a complex, dialogue-driven family drama — Cristian Mungiu’s “Fjord” — fundamentally altered the atmosphere at the Cannes Film Festival. Although it was rapturously received for the most part, it rubbed some of the stuck-up critics the wrong way. Okay it’s just a few so far, but with the film not opening until October 9, the backlash may only just be in its infancy.In a review for the Sun from Cannes I called “Fjord” a “morally clear takedown of tyrannical, woke-minded scolds, and therefore a tale that will resonate both among fair-minded centrists and conservatives the world over.” Yet significantly, given the left-minded attitudes of the visiting Cannes press as well as the filmmakers who always constitute the jury, “Fjord” wound up winning the festival’s coveted Palme d’Or.The response that greeted this fascinating, sharply-written, slow-build film — about the primacy of family versus officious progressives who wield an intrusive judgmental whip against a married Christian couple from Romania — was hard to neatly summarize, although snippy ripostes surfaced here and there.The victims in the film, which is inspired by true events, are Mihai and Lisbet Gheorghiu, played by Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinve. They have five young children and have recently moved from Bucharest to a picturesque Norwegian village where Lisbet grew up. Despite an initially warm welcome, the Gheorghiu clan is soon grappling with persecution at the hands of a pair of icily-mannered women from Child Services (Ellen Dorrit Petersen, Lisa Loven Kongsli) and, eventually, an ardent prosecuting attorney (Christian Rubeck).Soon after the school term begins the Gheorghius are suspected of having physically abused their kids, particularly due to an apparent bruising of teenage Elia (Vanessa Ceban) that a local supervisor has noticed. In a twinkling the five kids (including a suckling infant) are taken away from their parents pending a Child Services investigation, which yields nothing in terms of evidence, conclusive or otherwise. That’s because the underlying reason for the investigation, we gradually discern, is community disapproval of the Gheorghiu family. The Gheorghius’ sins, or offenses, are their hardcore conservative values as far as child-rearing and setting boundaries and corporal disciplines are concerned. Mr. Stan’s Mihai also insists upon Bible studies and frowns upon gays.This is a strict, right wing, traditional-marriage couple who don’t believe in progressivism and maintain strict rules — no social media, no rock music, no YouTube access, no smartphones. In essence the Gheorghius are regarded as foreign oddballs with an unpleasant, arguably joyless approach to parenting, and the progressive Norwegian villagers simply don’t like them, especially the brusquely mannered Mihai. Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinve in ‘Fjord.’ Cannes Film FestivalMake no mistake: “Fjord” is a complex, somewhat ambiguous, thoughtful assault upon left totalitarianism — a takedown of invasive woke-think. Accordingly, it seems to have drawn some ire. In a Facebook post on May 24 film scholar B. Ruby Rich passed along an observation from an “esteemed curator” that called Mr. Mungiu‘s award-winner “the MAGA film.” In a New Yorker piece titled “All the Films in Competition at Cannes 2026, Ranked from Best to Worst“, published on May 27, critic Justin Chang snooted the following sentence: “More than a few [Cannes observers] wondered if Mungiu, whose Romanian-set films have forcefully criticized religious fundamentalism, had suddenly moved rightward as his camera drifted west [to Norway].”This notion about Mungiu’s social-political perceptions is an oblique, carefully phrased way of saying Mr. Mungiu’s thinking (on this film at least) may have evolved. (There’s a certain vague irony, by the way, in Mr. Stan having played President Trump in 2024’s unflattering biopic “The Apprentice.” Mr. Trump called the film, based upon his life, from the early ‘70s to mid ‘80s, a “cheap, defamatory, and politically disgusting hatchet job.”)Actually “Fjord” is absorbing, intriguing, well-textured and investigatory. But it clearly comes down on the side of Mihai, Lisbet and the kids. At the end of the day the Norwegian Child Services reps are unquestionably the bad guys. “Fjord” isn’t exactly “aimed” at Christian audiences, but how will they respond when it opens in theaters six weeks from now? American heartland viewers, who loved “Sound of Freedom”, “Heaven Is For Real” and “The Passion of the Christ,” and who are destined to faint over Mel Gibson’s upcoming two-part epic “The Resurrection of the Christ,” might adopt a passing interest in “Fjord.” But the film may be insufficiently emotional and too subtle and studied for the mainstream popcorn crowd.What is remarkable about “Fjord” is that it comes out of a system and a culture that always portrays social issues in a pro-left or LGBT-friendly manner, or at least left-progressive. It’s mind-blowing that a film by the formidable Cristian Mungiu, whose 2007 breakthrough effort was an abortion drama, “4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days”, has launched a withering assault upon woke values while lamenting the persecution of Christians. When I asked him about this at a Cannes Film Festival press conference, Mr. Mungiu confirmed he was out to make a deftly-served, socio-political drama that went against the grain. “I don’t believe in films which reconfirm what you believe already,” he said. “There are already a lot of films doing this for some time in cinema. If you just think about the choice of selection in festivals in the last 10 to 15 years, everybody tells you the same thing.”Mr. Mungiu added: “I don’t think that cinema should do this. Cinema should try to make you reconsider your opinions…because we live in this world in which we are so much influenced by the trend and…the trend today became so strong that you pretty much lost a little bit of the freedom of speaking aside, of thinking aside, from everybody else…you need to be bold today to express something which is different from the main view. That’s what I’m trying to do.”Sharon Stone at the Cannes Film Festival premiere of ‘Fjord’ on May 18. Kristy Sparow/Getty ImagesAfter debuting Stateside at the Telluride Film Festival in the first week of September and then moving on to the Toronto Film Festival a week later, ‘Fjord” will play in the Spotlight section of the forthcoming New York Film Festival. This is something of a consolation spot at NYFF; for the last ten years the main slate at the festival had included the previous May’s Palme d’Or winner.Furthermore Mr. Mungiu’s films have always been included in the main slate ever since “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days.” This time NYFF’s Main Slate selection committee members, who include the New Yorker’s Mr. Chang, have decided differently.Despite the acclaim and the awards, the highly rated “Fjord” — 90% positive — is nonetheless Cristian Mungiu’s lowest-rated film on Rotten Tomatoes over the last 18 years. The initial NYFF snub has reinforced a sense that woke film critics are going to rhetorically diminish “Fjord” when the award season gathers pace at the end of 2026 and beginning of 2027. This is obviously a projection, but I’m sensing that they’re going to chip-chip and chisel-chisel in a kind of “death of a thousand cuts” fashion, and backhand it ever so gently.They will likely do this because “Fjord” is not so much a portrait of a progressive community trying to subject a conservative couple to political hardship as it is a big canvas indictment of — not to sound overly strident — woke Stalinism. Because Mr. Mungiu’s film in some ways demonizes the left-progressive team. Because the Norwegian village in the film may as well be Salem, and the Gheorghius may as well be witches.

Could Acclaimed Family Drama ‘Fjord’ Be Seen as Too MAGA for Awards Season Glory?

Could Acclaimed Family Drama ‘Fjord’ Be Seen as Too MAGA for Awards Season Glory?

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