RFF 2026: 12:08 East of Bucharest

22 December, sixteen years after the Revolution, in a small town east of Bucharest. On a local TV talk show, the station owner, a hard-drinking history teacher and a lonely pensioner try to settle a single question: was there actually a revolution in their town? Did anyone take to the square before 12:08, the moment Ceaușescu fled Bucharest? As the phone-ins pour in and memories contradict one another, Porumboiu’s deadpan comedy becomes a sly and generous inquiry into how history is made, remembered and argued over. Twenty years on, it remains one of the defining films of the Romanian New Wave.

Followed by a Q&A with director Corneliu Porumboiu.

Winner Caméra d’Or, Cannes Film Festival 2006 (Directors’ Fortnight)