Synopsis

“Pororoca” is the name of a huge flood which troubles the Amazon and its tributaries every year in springtime. In the language of the indigenous Tupi, the word means something like “big, destructive rumble”. The flood can be up to four metres high, sweeping away everything that stands in its path. In a different way, something similarly disastrous happens to the young Romanian couple, Cristina and Tudor. One day, their well-off urban life is dreadfully disrupted. When Tudor goes to the park with their two children, Maria (aged five and a half) and Ilie (aged seven years), the unthinkable happens: Tudor is briefly distracted and little Maria disappears without a trace. What follows is the ultimate horror. All at once, the seemingly peaceful and ordinary everyday life of the small family turns into a terrible nightmare, and the nagging questions of the investigating policemen are only the beginning. All the problems of this situation come crashing down on the young parents. Director Constantin Popescu knows exactly how to depict their emotions – incredulity, desperation and guilt – in a deeply moving and upsetting film. We, as the viewers, do not feel much differently.