From the very beginning, we kept in touch with the public — always observing audience appetite, the desires, and what people are open to. Everyone we spoke to about Romanian or Eastern European cinema noted its scarcity in the Netherlands. That was the itch that made us begin the ROfilmNL project.
What started as programming and advocacy slowly became something else. ROfilmNL began as an attempt to create visibility, but over time we realised visibility is not enough. What matters is framing, positioning, and translation. So we began asking different questions — about how films travel across cultural contexts.
The audience was not the issue
This February, a Romanian film screened at IFFR played to full rooms. The comedy "3 Days in September," directed by Tudor Giurgiu and shot in a single 65-minute long take, made a strong impression. The same happened with the events we organised independently: they sold out, and the cinemas were filled with a mixed public — a wide range of ages and nationalities.
Films that break the national barrier, when positioned properly, resonate beyond borders to an international audience. Yet when we approached institutions to curate Romanian-focused programmes, the answer was consistently no — sometimes politely, sometimes firmly. The audience, it turns out, was not the issue. A pattern began to emerge.
Institutions often operate within inherited assumptions about audience appetite.
Eastern and Central European cinema is often treated as "special interest" rather than core programming. Proximity, it turns out, does not necessarily translate into cultural integration. The question becomes: what are the necessary ingredients to shift the context from foreign films to familiar and desirable ones?
Who defines the audience's desires?
After analysing the programmes of several independent cinemas across the Netherlands, a pattern emerges. US films dominate the schedule — expected, given the marketing power of the big studios. France follows with a strong presence, then the UK and domestic Dutch productions. The remainder is made up of films from Asia, South America, or occasionally the Middle East, with relatively little presence from Central and Eastern Europe. Classifications vary, but across a year of observation, the pattern is consistent.
Why does demonstrated audience interest not translate into structural programming support? The programming focuses on the familiar "Western world." This context of familiarity makes a cinema feel "inside" rather than "outside."
It takes time, and a lot of risk, to offer new stories to an audience — to guide them outside the familiar. Risk is unevenly distributed too. Some cinemas are programmed as part of the cultural conversation; others are programmed as exceptions. Film theatres constantly juggle financial risk, which may explain why programming is often planned week by week, while other types of cultural events are planned months in advance. Another reason unfamiliar cinemas are rarely shown is the fear of audience alienation: as a viewer you want to be surprised, but not so much that empathy breaks.
Framing redefines value
Each cinema or chain of cinemas has an identity shaped by years of curatorship, and an audience built around it. Few institutions want to alter a formula that already works. From time to time something different is added, but without shifting the overall direction. Certain cinemas are treated as events rather than continuities — and that is what keeps the distance. Romanian films, and others like them, often fall into the second category: granted visibility, but not belonging.
The issue is not about quality. Production quality has risen so much that nowadays Eastern and Western productions are technically comparable. It's about framing. In design or curatorship, the same visual object can mean different things depending on context. Placement changes perception. Framing redefines value.
Cinema works the same way. A Romanian film in a "New Voices of Europe" programme feels integrated. The same film as a one-off "special screening" feels peripheral.
Context as infrastructure
We have clear data that when festivals programme Romanian films, they work. When independent events are organised, they sell out — proof that the interest is there. But sold-out screenings do not automatically shift institutional perception. Evidence alone is not always persuasive. Integration requires more than audience demand.
Context, usually treated as an accessory, needs to become infrastructure.
We do not claim to have answers. But we want to ask better questions about how cinema circulates, and who gets to move. These questions are what led us to start Screen Context — a space to think about how films move across cultural contexts.