Freedom on the Mountain. Transylvanian documentary, dir. László Csibi, 2025, 52’. With Romanian subtitles

The film explores the widespread tradition in central Romania of watching football matches from the mountains. In the 1980s, Romania’s only television broadcaster, Romanian Television, which served exclusively the purposes of propaganda and the cult of personality under Ceaușescu’s dictatorship, stopped broadcasting major sporting events such as European Championships, World Cups, international cups, and other prestigious competitions. As a result, people living in the country’s inland regions were forced to find an alternative: they began climbing the hills and mountains near their communities to watch major sporting events using improvised antennas capable of receiving television broadcasts from neighboring countries such as Hungary, Yugoslavia, and Bulgaria.

Discussion with director László Csibi and sociologist László Péter, expert in the film.