Romania spent forty-five years making films for a state that wanted historical epics, and then, within about four years of 2001, produced one of the most exactly defined new waves in the history of the form. The rules read like a manifesto nobody bothered to write down: real time, long takes, one location, no score, and either the middle eighties or the day after the revolution as the subject. It has taken the Palme d'Or once and the Golden Bear three times out of an industry that makes a couple of dozen films a year.