The two national libraries, the Library of the Academy of the Socialist Republic of Romania and the Central State Library, together maintain stocks in excess of 10 million volumes, and both function as central book depositories. The Library of the Academy of the Socialist Republic of Romania, a precommunist institution founded in 1867, holds special collections of Romanian, Greek, Slavonic, Oriental, and Latin manuscripts, maps, and engravings as well as rare collections of documents, medals, and coins. The Central State Library, founded in 1955, also has important collections of books, periodicals, musical works, maps, and photographs and, in addition, acts as the Central Stationery Office and the National Exchange for books. It also issues the National Bibliography and annual catalogs, which list all books printed in Romania and the holdings of all foreign books in the state library system.
The largest libraries among the universities, each of which holds more than 1.5 million volumes, are those at Bucharest, Iasi, and Cluj. These holdings include the book stocks maintained in the libraries of the various faculties, hostels, and institutes associated with the universities as well as the central university library itself. The largest documentary library, the Library of the Medical-Pharmaceutical Institute, operates ninety-nine branch facilities, and its annual book inventory has been in excess of 1.2 million volumes.
FILMS
As in the case of other elements of the mass media, the small motion picture industry has also been affected by the intensified ideological campaign of mid-1971. In general, the regime has attempted to further limit the importation of foreign films, particularly those from the West, which are considered violent and decadent. There has also been a move to stimulate the production of more native films with a truly "profound ideological content which will express our Marxist-Leninist world outlook, convey the message of our own society in highly artistic terms, and reflect the life of the new man." Until more Romanian films of the appropriate type can be offered, the industry has been advised to utilize additional films from the National Film Library and to emphasize foreign presentations that are based on socialist concepts.
Production
Film production, distribution, and exhibition were controlled by the National Center of Cinematography, a state agency that operates under the supervision of the Council on Socialist Culture and Education. The national center operates two production studios: the Alexandru Sahia Film Studio in Bucharest, which produces documentaries, newsreels, cartoons, and puppet films, and the Bucharest Film Studio, which produces feature films at Buftea, a suburb about fifteen miles northwest of the capital.
In 1970 cinema production consisted of thirty-nine feature and short pictures, about 1960 documentary films (including animated cartoons), and seventy-six newsreels. This output reflected a two-fold increase since 1960 in both feature and documentary films but a decrease of about 15 percent in the number of newsreels. The largest growth in the motion picture industry occurred between 1923 and 1930, when production rose from about seven motion pictures per year to about twenty-five. This increased output was a combination of native films and features coproduced with France, Germany, and Hungary. After the communist takeover of the government in 1948, film production fell drastically and did not again reach its pre-World War II level until 1955.
Romanian films, until 1968, continued to reflect much of the earlier French influence. Both the native and coproduced pictures of this period were of high quality, and several won awards at film festivals in Cannes, Trieste, and Chicago. Subjects treated were well diversified and included historical adventure, strong dramas, and both satirical and classical comedies. Beginning in 1968, the regime launched widespread criticism of the industry, and the quality of production decreased appreciably. The 1971 ideological campaign forced film making into a further regression. Western observers characterized post-1968 films as being totally lacking in originality.
Because of the relatively low number of Romanian films produced, the industry has generally depended on the importation of sizable numbers of foreign films to meet its needs. The government no longer publishes official statistics dealing with film imports, but in 1960 the regime reported that 188 feature films and 150 documentaries from foreign countries were shown. Approximately 40 percent of these films came from the Soviet Union; the remainder came from France, East Germany, England, Italy, Czechoslovakia, and the United States.
Distribution