Cinema of Romania

The cinema of Romania is the art of motion-picture making within the nation of Romania or by Romanian filmmakers abroad. The history of cinema in Romania dates back to the late 19th century, as early as the history of film itself. With the first set of films screened on May 27, 1896, in the building of L'Indépendance Roumanie newspaper in Bucharest. In the Romanian exhibition, a team of Lumière brothers' employees screened several films, including the famous L'Arrivée d'un train en gare de La Ciotat. The next year, in 1897, the French cameraman Paul Menu (an employee of the Lumière brothers) shot the first film set in Romania, The Royal parade on May 10, 1897. The first Romanian filmmaker was doctor Gheorghe Marinescu. He created a series of medically themed short films for the first time in history between 1898 and 1899.

The cinema of Romania has been home to many internationally acclaimed films and directors. The first internationally awarded Romanian movie was the 1938 documentary Țara Moților (about Moților Land in the Apuseni Mountains, Romania) directed by Paul Călinescu which received a prize at the 1939 7th Venice International Film Festival. The first Romanian film that won an award from the Cannes Film Festival was the 1957 animated short film "Scurtă istorie" (A Short History) directed by Ion Popescu-Gopo. The film won the Short Film Palme d'Or at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival. The first live-action Romanian film that won an award from the Cannes Film Festival was the 1965 film Forest of the Hanged. The film's director, Liviu Ciulei won the award for Best Director at the 1965 Cannes Film Festival.

Romanian cinema achieved wide international recognition in the 2000s with the Romanian New Wave movement that often incorporated a genre of realist and minimalist films that won many awards at European film festivals such as the Cannes Film Festival and the Berlin International Film Festival.