Discoveries from Romania World Cinema

Love between two people and other feelings that can influence it: selfishness, meanness, violence, envy of those around them.

A series of short stories with bottles.

A clay figure sees its face reflected in the water of a river.

A modern parable about the man who learns to build walls and houses.

A stop-motion animation about a girl made of gingerbread.

Cafeneaua viitorului preserves an ephemeral episode in the history of the internet, today a phenomenon difficult to dissociate from everyday experience, then a novelty that barely captured the attention of a diverse audience.

Compiling various footage from Bucharest at the end of the millennium, Niculae Popescu's film aims to imprint on film the transient image of post-socialist society, caught between two worlds denoting different aspirations and presenting great social contrasts.

A poisoned female action hero embarks on a desperate quest for an antidote—only to slowly discover she’s not real, but a character in a film whose fate is sealed.

After the death of her best friend, Cleo tries to carry out her dream: publishing a book of poems. Caught between the pressure of the promise she made and her increasingly fragile relationship with her boyfriend, Arthur, Cleo struggles with grief, longing, and the need for meaning. “Promise Me” is an amateur film about loss, obsession, love, and the fragility of adolescence.

Short animated film with a western theme.

A follow-up to the classic propaganda film Ion Marin's Letter to The Spark (1949). Twenty-0five years on, has collective agriculture fared as well as Ion Marin foretold?

In December 1955, the professional community around Sahia celebrate the fifth anniversary of their institution by producing this films meant to be screened in the opening of the anniversary party and only for insiders of the studio. The film copy available at the National Film Archive has no credits therefore we cannot be specific about the type of involvement of each member of the studio in the making of this film.

Created with a political-educational purpose and, at the end of the ‘70s, incorporated into the Cîntarea României (Song to Romania) Festival, the Film Festival for the Villages was one of the longest running cultural-political events in Socialist Romania. This film, conceived as a marketing device / trailer for an upcoming festival, is an example of Sahia ephemera. Seen today, it gives us a chance to carry out an ad-hoc archaeology of the film festival as an institution. The film served to increase the festival’s visibility around the country, to announce the dates of the event, and to build expectations among audiences for a certain time of year—in this case, 12 December 1959-31 March 1960.

“Wedding in Leresti: American couple gets married in the Orthodox tradition as local priest is appointed Texan sheriff” – this was the title of a feature published in the August 1973 issue of Tribuna României, a trilingual (French-English-German) Romanian publication targeted at foreign audiences. The unusual event was documented in a Sahia film commissioned by Publiturism, the media arm of Romania’s National Tourism Office, which credited Paul Anghel, the editor-in-chief of the periodical, as scriptwriter.

Celebrates the 500th journal made since August 23rd 1944.

Part of the series made at "Alexandru Sahia" Studios.

Ali's 5th birthday party transforms into a shocking and chaotic ritual improvised by his grandparents. Moments of humor, intimacy, and turmoil, a poignant examination of identity, tradition, and the intricate dynamics within modern families.

A young queer woman finds herself in an inhospitable alternate world, and has to choose between conforming to the rules and hide her identity or accept her true identity and face the monsters that seek to destroy her.

"The whole world is a stage and all people are actors. They rise and fall in turn, each one: A man plays several roles in life, And the acts are the seven ages..." (William Shakespeare, How You Like It) The story of a man - Mihai Sarca - for whom the theater means everything and for whom a whole life defined himself by his passion for the stage and for the people who serve it, thus becoming the treasurer of an archive collection and, at the same time, a living encyclopedia of the Romanian theatrical phenomenon of the last century.

Constantin Noica spent the last years of his life "1400 meters above humanity", as he liked to say - in Păltiniș. Far from the communist gray, but still kept under observation by the Securitate, the philosopher found in this place the joy of talking about wisdom. In the modest room on the 1st floor of Villa 12, what we know as the "Păltiniș School" was born.

The documentary presents a series of pickpockets who have elevated pickpocketing to an art form. We delve into their personal and professional lives and discover the mentality and spirit behind such thefts. We hear the stories of people who come from disadvantaged backgrounds, who have had addictions, who grew up on the streets or people who have come to know first hand the systems, laws and conditions of detention in different prisons across Europe. Some are incurably ill, others have become integrated into the social systems of other countries, have learned to read and write, have a social life, have a home and spend their time constructively.

The world of Viorica Cătuna, from Poiana Cătunarilor, in Transylvania, somewhere at 1200 meters altitude. A former teacher, she has always been passionate about knowledge, books, poetry and music. We learn her story, the history of her family and the history of her community, all in correlation with historical events that have taken place over the years. A portrait of this woman and the times, from when she learns the stories of her family to the future plans she has in her 80s. A charismatic and storied character, an encyclopedia of a vanishing community.

A visit to the director's hometown is the opportunity to bring to an end a series of sensitive, long-postponed discussions targeting topics such as identity, the drag scene in Romania, sexual orientation and the social pressure imposed by all of this. Three days that fail to find a clear conclusion, an attempt at dialogue in which the family dynamic evolves from comic to tragic and tender.

While hunting a mysterious boar, a man gets lost in the forest. He encounters increasingly strange things, and his life is put in danger.

Every autumn, shepherds from Transylvania set off with their flocks in search of green grass. This Sheep Road is to some extent like the famous historic Silk Road and the Salt Road.

Alice and Dorian are raising their three- or four-year-old boy together. Only she is an 18-year-old high school student, and he is a 53-year-old man.

At the village pub, Philip meets a local celebrity, a nonchalant and extremely determined character. Gigi Meserie, a local musician, is undeterred by the pandemic. On the contrary, he manages to turn every opportunity into an opportunity. Gigi's goal is to convince the townspeople "to turn their faces towards us", the country folk.

Jean Mihail’s "Rapsodia Rustica" deals with the life in Romanian villages in the period after the war.

" The Department of Applied Electronics at Bucharest's Polytechnic Institute created and tested a computer-based image-processing installation. The ways in which the discoveries could be used are presented. "

Tesa is an ordinary house dog, living with her owner Cristi. One day, she will disappear and start projecting images and thoughts of her own. She will become Tesaurus, an endemic species of a talking dog.

Romanian horror movie from 1960.

Short animation

Part of Romanian Short Waves 2013 (1)

A short film following a healer from Maramureș region, Romania.

Two neo-peasants, digital avatars in the flesh, are put to work by a mini usb windmill in order to keep the village running. They imagine themselves alone and are surprised when their paths finally cross. Serendipity?

"Life is a Bitch" is a sci-fi video-novel which finds its set in a possible future where the Left has the opportunity to build its project on Europa, moon of planet Jupiter. The short film follows the struggle of a left-minded couple which couldn’t afford the flight to the “Socialist Moon”.

A heartfelt and honest look at the plight of the civilians of Ukraine and the volunteers who have embraced them as family amidst their war-torn countryside.

The sounds and images of war are reflected in the content of children’s play.

Different worlds at different time scales.

Rebeca, Iulia and Florin, a film crew with not much experience, decide to shoot a documentary about the mysterious Toni Oniga. They have heard about him from many friends and are very interested in meeting him. But he turns out to be very hard to find. The filmmakers get the impression that people don’t want to say where Toni Oniga is. They have only good things to say about him, that he was like salvation to them, but never go into any details. Things get more and more confusing. Is it possible that Tony Oniga is an urban legend and never really existed?

A handful of young documentary filmmakers have to make a report on a lathe machine enterprise. Only that Documentary About… is also a playful, almost cheeky film about its own making.

Bogdan Mihailescu creates a short animation about the famous Gopo`s little man.

What if as a result of the Original Sin, God didn't cast out both Adam and Eve from Paradise? What if the actual punishment were more sinister than that? If you had to wait an entire life just to see your lover, could you endure it?

One of the very rare Romanian abstract films. Rhythms presents concrete objects that break down into all sorts of colours, shapes and shifting substances.

The film is a classical process-film that describes the making of commercial products, from initial manufacturing of raw material to final selling.