This book examines small cinemas and their presentation of society in times of crisis and conflict from an interdisciplinary and intercultural point of view. The authors concentrate on economic, social and political challenges and point to new phenomena which have been exposed by film directors. They present essays on, among others, Basque cinema; gendered controversies in post-communist small cinemas in Slovakia and Czech Republic; ethnic stereotypes in the works of Polish filmmakers; stereotypical representation of women in Japanese avant-garde; post-communist political myths in Hungary; the separatist movements of Catalonia; people in diasporas and during migrations. In view of these timely topics, the book touches on the most serious social and political problems. The films discussed provide an excellent platform for enhancing debates on politics, gender, migration and new aesthetics in cinema at departments of history, sociology, literature and film.

Janina Falkowska is a retired professor from the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario (Canada) and Professor at the University of Economics and Humanities (WSEH) in Bielsko-Biala (Poland). She specializes in East-Central European and Western European cinemas and has published extensively on Polish and East-Central European cinemas in journals and books related to Eastern and Central Europe. She has initiated a series of conferences about small cinemas in Europe and organized workshops and conferences on European cinemas in Canada. Krzysztof Loska is Professor of Film and Media and the Director of the Institute of Audiovisual Arts at Jagiellonian University in Krakow (Poland). He has written extensively on media, popular culture, film theory and Japanese cinema in various journals and collective works. He is member of the board of Polish Society of Cultural Studies, Vice-President of Polish Society for Film and Media Studies, and member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the bi-monthly «Ekrany».