(2009; Politist, adjectiv, Romanian) Define conscience. As police officer Cristi (Dragos Bucur) waits outside his boss's office with his officemate Nelu (Ion Stoica) in the anteroom of Gina the secretary, while Capt Anghelache (Vlad Ivanov) reads his report, he yawns. By now I'm yawning as well.

Up to this point Cristi, undercover in blue jeans and jacket, has spent eight damp, cold days (the last two of which we're shown, making us feel as bored with the task as he feels) trailing Alex Iancu (Alexandru Sabadac) "the squealer" through drab, ugly, concrete blocks (from the Communist era) and observing his target smoking a joint with his companions, Victor and a girl. He spends hours waiting, watching, smoking cigarettes outside Alex's home to see who enters and exits, ostensibly looking for the source of Alex's hashish.

On a secret visit with the prosecutor, Cristi complains that nowhere else in Europe would what these kids are doing be a crime; the prosecutor reminds him that his boss expects him to perform a sting operation. Cristi says that ruining someone's life with an arrest and prison sentence would bother his conscience. In his daily reports (displayed in silence in longhand on the screen for the audience to read in full) Cristi describes his activities, adding his opinion that the suspects do not appear to be a threat to society.

After calling Alex, Cristi meets with the teenager at a restaurant, offering him vodka and a cigarette, which the boy declines (his father would notice the odor, though his dad isn't aware of the smell of pot) in preference for a Coke, and asking him to supply a sample of hash from Victor.

At home Cristi eats dinner alone while his wife Anca (Irina Saulescu), a teacher, sitting at her computer, listens to a love song. Discussing the symbolism in the lyrics with her husband, she explains the rhetorical device of anaphora, which he fails to appreciate, though as he's brushing his teeth he says: "It's like 'What would toothpaste be without a toothbrush?'"

Trying to pin the blame on someone other than Alex, Cristi has to negotiate with people in the bureaucracy to cooperate in retrieving information (hoping to find a criminal record, perhaps the girl's brother) for his investigation. Anca points out a spelling error in his report, which he forgets to correct.

Finally granted admittance to the boss's inner sanctum, Capt Anghelache asks Cristi for the meaning of "conscience." He then requests that Gina bring in a dictionary for Cristi, who refuses to perform the sting, to read the definitions of "conscience," "law," and "morality." When one's own moral law attempts to usurp civil law, especially for a police officer, the result is chaos.

Intentionally tedious for over an hour before delivering its punch, director/writer Corneliu Porumboiu's dry social comedy includes a scene of Cristi and three other men playing a game of foot-tennis (like volleyball played with a soccer ball, using only feet and head for volleys, on a court with a net).

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