B.D. la munte și la mare (1971)

The film is divided into two segments, “Powders for Grandma” and “The Miracle-Working Icon,” and follows the members of a Miscellaneous Crimes Brigade at a militia precinct as they solve two cases: Captain Panait (Toma Caragiu), Warrant Officer Căpșună (Sebastian Papaiani), Senior Sergeant Cristoloveanu (Dumitru Furdui), and the German shepherd Costel. The film begins with the release from prison of three friends: Gogu Steriade (Dem Rădulescu), Trandafir (Puiu Călinescu), and Patraulea (Jean Constantin). Once free, all three get married at the same time: Patraulea marries Luminița Mardare, Trandafir marries Maricica Teică, and Gogu marries Stela Mocuță. As the three couples leave the town hall, where they have made their relationships official, they meet the group of militiamen from the Miscellaneous Crimes Brigade, who have come to attend Warrant Officer Căpșună’s wedding to Miss Angela (Reka Nagy). In the first segment, “Powders for Grandma,” Major Dobrescu (Iurie Darie) sends the members of the Miscellaneous Crimes Brigade on vacation with their families to the Black Sea coast. The Bucharest militiamen are to take part in a joint operation directed by the Constanța Militia leadership. Three rooms have been reserved for them at a hotel in the resort of Venus. During their vacation on the coast, the militiamen from the Miscellaneous Crimes Brigade encounter the three crooks again: Patraulea and Trandafir are putting on a musical and dance show at a summer garden in Mangalia, while Gogu is working as a guide for Mișu Vasilesco (Ion Finteșteanu), a foreign con man who left Romania 30 years earlier. In cooperation with the Constanța militiamen, the members of the Miscellaneous Crimes Brigade, joined by Senior Lieutenant Paula Deleanu and Lieutenant Pârvulescu from Bucharest, must uncover and break up a drug-trafficking gang that plans to enter the country through the Vama Veche border crossing. The Bucharest militiamen follow three foreign cars in which they suspect the drugs are hidden. They see an accomplice who has been waiting by the roadside pick up a briefcase, but they fail to find the drugs. Suspecting that the Militia is following him, the Romanian accomplice gives the package of drugs to his brother-in-law, a waiter known as Uncle Gicu. The waiter cannot go to Constanța, however, because the director of the trust is due to arrive for an inspection. The waiter gives the package to Patraulea, telling him that it contains powders for his grandmother, who has an ulcer. The box then passes to Trandafir, who unknowingly takes a dose of drugs, and finally to Gogu, who is escorting Vasilesco to Constanța. Meanwhile, the militiamen from the Miscellaneous Crimes Brigade follow the Romanian accomplice’s fiancée, who is supposed to receive the drugs in Constanța and drive them to Oradea. Captain Panait arrests her, and she tells the investigators that her fiancé was to bring the package to a house in Constanța, then meet the traffickers in front of the casino to collect his money. The militiamen go to the meeting place and obtain the drugs. Ten minutes after the woman is arrested, two of the three cars head back toward the border. That same evening, in front of the casino, the foreign hunters in the third car try to kill the accomplice by shooting him. The hunters are arrested, and the militiamen learn from the wounded accomplice that the traffickers had hidden the drugs in the engine, but were afraid to transport narcotics through Romania by car. They had turned to him, promising to pay him 15,000 lei. After returning to Bucharest once the drug-trafficking case is solved, the members of the Miscellaneous Crimes Brigade are given a complaint to investigate by Major Dobrescu. The complaint was filed by the leadership of Agapia Monastery, which reports that a man named Radu Cosmin, who stayed at the monastery for two weeks, failed to pay his accommodation costs or the debts he had run up with the nuns and, when leaving, took a silver chalice worth 300 lei. When Captain Panait goes to his home, he learns that Radu Cosmin made reproductions of icons at the monastery and that his expenses were supposed to be paid by the person who hired him, the painter Matei Dumbrăveanu. Radu Cosmin pays his expenses, and the Miscellaneous Crimes Brigade begins investigating Matei Dumbrăveanu’s activities. Dumbrăveanu had been sentenced to 15 years in prison for forging paintings and had been free for six years. With three days of vacation remaining, the members of the Miscellaneous Crimes Brigade go to Moldavia to follow Matei Dumbrăveanu’s trail. In the process, they discover that the miracle-working icon at Agapia Monastery has been stolen and replaced with a copy. In recent days, the monastery has been visited by several foreign tourists, mostly in groups, as well as by a French tourist accompanied by a Romanian. After making a composite sketch of the Romanian, the militiamen discover that he was Gogu Steriade. The Bucharest militiamen put Gogu under surveillance and uncover his connection to Vasilesco. Promising to secure them contracts abroad—in London, Paris, and Tokyo—Vasilesco persuades the three friends to go to the wine cellar at Sihăstria Hermitage and bring him a drawing board bearing sketches made at several monasteries in Moldavia. The three fly to Suceava, but the militiamen from the Miscellaneous Crimes Brigade arrive too late because the clocks have gone forward to summer time that day. The three crooks reach Sihăstria Hermitage and retrieve the drawing board, intending to take it back to Bucharest. At the same time, Vasilesco holds a reception in honor of his old associates in Bucharest, “the city of my great coups.” He tells them that he intends to organize a large-scale export of icons stolen from monasteries in Romania. But the crooks mock him when they learn that he sent Gogu and his friends to retrieve the drawing board containing the miracle-working icon stolen from Agapia. The militiamen from the Miscellaneous Crimes Brigade reach Sihăstria Hermitage after Gogu and his friends have left with the miracle-working icon. They nevertheless manage to arrest Vasilesco’s other accomplices, and then catch the three friends as well, recovering the icon from them. Although Gogu and his friends insist they did not know what they were carrying, they are arrested along with Vasilesco.