Post-Communist Era
The Romanian New Wave is a term that is applied to the recent boom of the independent film market in Post-Communist Romanian. Because of the economic state that Romania is in there is not much money for the film industry as in other countries, so independent film companies have been producing now world famous movies describing their own history of their country. The film industry in Romania can be outline in three distinct points. The Early Years of the film industry the country had the money to produce films, the freedom but not the skills. The Communist Era of the Film Industry Romania had the money, the skills but did not have the freedom to express their artistic talents. Currently Romania has the skills and the freedom but lacks the funds to create the Hollywood Films that are seen in America. So the films that they produced are independent successful New Wave Films Like the Ones Featured Below
The Paradox: Freedom of Content, Skill, but lack of FundingBackgroundAfter Nicolae Ceausescu death by firing squad on Christmas Day in 1989 Romania experienced a transition into democracy.
Romania's transition was especially unique because of its revolutionist uprising that led to the death of one leader with no real action or plan for another leader. The presidency fell into the hands of Ion Iliescu, one of the leading figures of the Front for National Salvation.
Official parliamentary elections were held on May 20, 1990. Petre Roman, a university professor with strong family roots in the communist party was selected as prime minister.
A new constitution was drafted and adopted in December of 1991. Article 30 of the Constitution grants citizens "Freedom of expression of thoughts, opinions, or beliefs and freedom of any creation by words, in writing, in pictures, by sounds or other means of communication in public are inviolable."
The new government in Romania and fall of the old led to the new paradox of Romania, freedom of speech, freedom of content, but lack of funding.
Freedom of ContentAs stated above unlike the rule under Nicolae Ceausescu Romanian citizens since the uprising have the freedom to produce any content that they desire. This freedom has led to the New Wave Movement in Romanian a movement that features film that discuss the horrors of Ceausescu's Regime. One of the most famous, rather infamous displays about living in the Communist Era is the movie "4 Months, 3 weeks, and 2 days" a film about getting an illegal abortion in Communist Romania. During Ceausescu's reign he saw his countries low population rates and wanted to increase the size of his nation. His citizens of his country had no desire to reproduce more children because of the food shortages and lack of resources for providing for the child. This film reached an international audience and won numerous awards at the Cannes film festival. This film is an example of the small but successful New Wave market in Romania that displays and starts a conversation of what once was taboo.
SkillRomania since its inception of utilizing the film medium as a form of entertainment has been most successful in displaying life sans CGI with the exception of Ion Popescu Gopo . In either the forms of a historical documentary as "The Documentary of Nicolae Ceausescu" successfully does, or the film "If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle". The New Wave of Romanian Film industry does not have success in displaying film in a technology world, but it does have the success of story telling. Raw storytelling. This is what the New Wave movement in Romania is all about, ripping off the bandage of the censorship past and visualizing and putting words to the atrocities that happened over the course of forty years. Romania's film industry is successful as a story teller.
Lack of FundingWith the denationalization of the Cinema in Romania, and the lack of use of propaganda in a Democratic state, Romania's film industry has had some issues with funding. To add insult to injury the success of the New Wave film industry with the exception of "4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days" has had trouble appealing to a Romanian audience. "If I Want to Whistle I Whistle" was only, an international success and not a domestic success. This means that if a movie producer wants to make a Romanian New Wave film the audience base is outside of the domestic audience, if it cannot reach that pull, then the film will not be made. Further issues with funding have occured with the new Prime Minster in Romanania who has completly restructured the government's culture board with members of his party's instead of the oppositions. This has caused trouble with film produces because of a lack of relationship and connection with the new board. These three stipulations are what has lead to a continued issue of funding for Romanian cinema up till today.
Romania's Cinema is a fantastic tale that can be chronicaled through three distinct periods, "The Early Years" , "The Communist Era" and "The Post Communist Era". It has suffered from a unique paradox through each of these periods having only two of three things necessary for a successful industry
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The Autobiography of Nicolae CeausescuWith the New Wave Era there has been a direct move to analyze the past and see how and why it happened the way it did. This Documentary by Andrei Ujica is a three hours long and cover the 25 years of the leaders life using solely original footage from the Romanian Archives. The Cannes Film Festival that year had this to say about the documentary: "During the summary trial that he and his wife were submitted to, Nicolae Ceausescu is reviewing his long reign in power: 1965-1989. From a formal point of view, The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceausescu proves that it is possible to only use existing images to yield films focused on recent history, yet with an epic vein similar to that of the historical fiction cinema. This is an eminently syntactic endeavor, where montage plays a twofold part: mise-en-scene, as it builds scenes that do not exist as such in the rushes, and classical editing, connecting scenes together."
4 months, 3 weeks and 2 daysThis film was made in 2007 and was written and directed by Cristian Mungiu. The film won two prestigious awards at the Cannes Film festival that year. The films set in Communist Romania in the final years of Ceausescu's reign and describes the stories of a pregnant female and her friend. The females are roommates in a university setting at a time where contraception and abortion was illegal. The pregnant female and her friend seek to find an illegal dangerous way to have an abortion and end up paying Mr. Bebe, the man willing to do the abortion, with sex. This film shows the harsh realities of living in a communist era, and dealing with a modern issue like abortion. It was received well and is critically acclaimed around the world.
If I Want to Whistle, I WhistleThis film was made in 2010 and was directed by Florin Serban. It is notable because it discusses a topic of interest among many Romanian's today the topic of identity. The film features a man who is angry at his mother for fleeing his motherland and going to Italy, while he feels it his duty to stay in Romania. It is important to see that films like this discuss topics that were once taboo and still are hard to talk about in Romania today. This film does an adequate job of addressing these issues.
The following information on this webpage was provided by the following sources.
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