Long, but good

I saw it today at BAFICI and I liked it. I was amazed by the quality and diversity of footage they had to work with, and I can't imagine how many hours they had to look through to narrow them down to 3. It was an excellent political biography of Ceausescu, and the only thing I was not too thrilled about was the length of certain scenes which, in my opinion were not too important, or were repetitive (like the 2 or 3 scenes of Nicolae at construction sites), or scenes that ran for too long.
Non-documentary directors can only dream of achieving some of the shots used without effects or actors: parades with thousands of people, Ceausescu playing backgammon in the Mediterranean, or the meetings between the Rumanian president and key political leaders of last century.
The film is also a great insight into the surreal excess of communist "happiness" and love? for their leaders.
I walked in without any clue as to who that person was, and I walked out feeling like he had been the president of my own country. Of course most of the footage is pre-approved propaganda, but it's still very interesting.
You get to see how he talks in public, his gestures, the evolution of Rumania.
The brief passages without sound were not a problem at all for me.