I Love Valentine's Day!: Hello! How Are You?

Here is a foreign love story.  This unconventional romantic story ends with a believable yet still not quite happy ending.  A married couple unbeknownst to each other chat online and fall in love again. This takes place in Romania and I guess the internet is not as pervasive there/not everyone has a computer. The couple, both named Gaby (Gabriel and Gabriela) seem happy and committed, but uninspired in their marriage. They have a teen son who seems to only think about sex, and has been bugging them for a computer, "for school" he says (but we know it is for other reasons!) Neither of his parents are knowledgeable on the computer.

Gabriel (Ionel Mihailescu) works as a page turner for a small orchestra and is often on tours away from home. We find out later that he was an accomplished musician but a hand accident forced him to give up his performance career. During one tour a musician asks him to accompany him to a tryst so that the friend can break up with his mistress, but as they end up having sex Gabriel spends time at an internet cafe and online in a chat room, which he has never done before.

Gabriela (Dana Voicu) works in a dry cleaner’s shop, where they have a new computer system she must learn. Her younger and more sexy coworker shows her a chat room where, without realizing who each other is, Gabriela and Gabriel connect and eventually fall in love. They both feel guilty but also in that blush of love, feeling as if the other really understands them. Although neither is truly unfaithful, either with their internet personas or other people in their physical lives, they spy on each other in innocent meetings with others and assume the worst.

Meanwhile, their son has his own sexual misadventures, where he THINKS he wants any one of the randy girls who pursue him, but instead falls for the nerdy girl instead.

Letters to Father Jacob

A woman newly out of prison (Kaarina Hazard) is given a job reading letters for a blind priest (Heikki Nousiainen). Leila is antagonistic and unapproachable, but finds the priest’s isolated home a way to transition back to being among normal people again. The letters she reads are from people asking for prayers for different reasons, which Father Jacob does. He sends back letters with hopeful messages, which Leila writes and sends for him. Sometimes the people send money donations, and this tempts Leila with thoughts to abandon her job and the priest. Slowly, though, we know her story and how it has shaped her personality and how Father Jacob draws her out in his slow unobtrusive manner. While she does hurtful things, she also does selfless things, such as pretending to read non-existent letters when the letters slowly stop coming.