ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at how historical and political events and European thought have shaped the idea of Eastern Europe and the concept of Eastern European cinema vis-à-vis the West. It also discusses the way the collapse of communism in 1989 and recent extension of the European Union have redefined the geographical reality of Eastern Europe and its cinemas, but not necessarily how they are perceived. The notion of "Eastern Europe" is by no means straightforward. Commentators agree that the major change exerting a profound impact on the cinemas of the region in the 1990s was a move away from state subsidised and unit-based studio film production to a free market dominated by producers; this contributed to a significant drop in film production across the region. Eastern European cinema participates in the new development of European globalised and transnational cinemas but at the same time it manifests the persistence of national and auteurist frameworks.
