Iwo Tuleya
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Eastern European Movie Club (2023)
- — Metronom (2022)
- — Innocent Sorcerers (1960)
- — Pupendo (2003)
- — Son of the White Mare (1981).
What is "Eastern Europe"? According to a widespread colloquial definition, it encompasses everything between Germany and the Ural Mountains. However, when examined closely, this description proves unsatisfactory. What about the former East Germany? What about the Balkans or Greece? What about the Baltic countries? Central Asia?
It seems that any possible filter used to define the region will prove the demarcation line wrong: religion (Poland — Catholic, Russia — Orthodox), language (Romania — Romance, Hungary — Finno-Ugric), political association (Czechia — EU, Ukraine — non-EU), and even affiliation with the former Eastern Bloc (would we say that China is Eastern Europe?). Yet, there is an unspoken connection between all of us — perhaps it’s a post-colonial sensibility, the way we love, our humor, or even our pagan roots. But should we even be looking for these connections?
In light of Russia’s barbaric invasion of Ukraine, ideas of imperial Pan-Slavism have resurfaced in public discourse. It may be impossible to separate the political from the social and cultural.
Is "Eastern Europe" an anachronistic, derogatory term? Or is there some truth in Johann Gottfried von Herder’s idea of a third entity, balancing the axis between the Germanic North and the Latin South? The films we selected for the take-over, from Romania, Poland, Czechia, and Hungary, carry the potential to answer some of these uncertainties.
Iwo Tuleya