Gadjo dilo is a 1997 film, directed and written by Tony Gatlif

Tony Gatlif

Tony Gatlif is a French film director of Romani ethnicity who also works as a screenwriter, composer, actor, and producer.- Biography :...

. The title means "Crazy Gadjo

Gadji

Gadjo is a term of Romani philosophy that means a person who has no Romanipen. Usually, that's a person who is not an ethnic Romani, but also it can be an ethnic Romani who does not live within the Romani culture....

 [non-Gypsy]" in Romani

Romani language

Romani or Romany, Gypsy or Gipsy is any of several languages of the Romani people. They are Indic, sometimes classified in the "Central" or "Northwestern" zone, and sometimes treated as a branch of their own....

.
Most of the film was shot at the village of Creţuleşti some kilometers from Bucharest

Bucharest

Bucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....

 and some of the actors are local Romani people.

Plot

Stéphane, a young French man from Paris, travels to Romania. He is looking for the singer Nora Luca, whom his father had heard all the time before his death. Wandering along a frozen road, he meets old Izidor, a member of the Roma (Gypsy) and tells him of Nora Luca. Izidor seems to understand and takes him to his village. Stéphane believes that Izidor will take him to Nora Luca when the time has come. So, he lives in the Roma village for several months. The other inhabitants dislike him at first (as he comes from those who call them thieves and attack their folks) but as they get to know him better, they grow to like him. In summer, the ice between him and beautiful Sabina finally cracks, and as she is able to translate between the Roma and him, Stéphane finds out that nobody ever understood a thing that he had said.

Cast

• Romain Duris
  Romain Duris
  -Life:Born on 28 May 1974 in Paris, son of an engineer-architect father, Duris studied arts at university. He was noticed in the street by a casting director whilst waiting in a queue in 1993 and offered a part in the 1994 Cédric Klapisch film Le péril jeune...
  
   as Stephane.
• Rona Hartner
  Rona Hartner
  Rona Hartner is a Romanian actress and singer.-External links:...
  
   as Sabina.
• Izidor Serban as Isidor.
• Ovidiu Balan as Sami.
• Angela Şerban as Angela.
• Adrian Minune as the child prodigy.
• Mónika Juhász Miczura
  Mónika Juhász Miczura
  Mónika Juhász Miczura is a Hungarian Roma singer, also known as "Mitsu" and "Mitsou". She is a former member of the highly acclaimed folk ensemble Ando Drom, and a founding member of the electronic/world music group Mitsoura. Her voice is widely considered unique...
  
   provides the voice of Nora Luca (unseen in the film).

Awards

In Thessaloniki

Thessaloniki

Thessaloniki , historically also known as Thessalonica, Salonika or Salonica, is the second-largest city in Greece and the capital of the region of Central Macedonia as well as the capital of the Decentralized Administration of Macedonia and Thrace...

, Greece

Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

, the film, translated in Greek as "Gadjo Dilo: There still are smiling Gypsies" won a prize in the 41st Thessaloniki Film Festival in 1998.

Connections

In 2006, Gatlif directed Transylvania

Transylvania (film)

Transylvania is a 2006 French drama film starring Asia Argento. In 2006, Director Tony Gatlif and composer Delphine Mantoulet won the "Georges Delerue Prize" at the Flanders International Film Festival for the score, and Gatlif was nominated for the "Grand Prix" award...

.
This time it is an Italian woman who travels from France to Romanian Transylvania to find her lover, a Gypsy musician.