Original subtitles

I was young, about seven or eight years old.

And someone said, �Let�s go to a video night!�

It was thrilling.

The whole context was thrilling. Watching foreign films for the first time,

almost illegal, because they weren�t allowed.

At least I felt that we were watching things we shouldn�t see.

Mom wouldn�t let me watch that film. It was considered...

Too erotic? Yes.

�Why is he doing that to her skirt?�

�What�s that? Look at her.�

Once Upon a Time in America with Robert De Niro.

Pretty Woman.

The Protector.

Nine and a Half Weeks.

�Goose, Goose I�m on your tail.�

Top Gun, wait a minute, Top Gun!

Speaking of serious, dramatic films, I saw Top Gun 38 times.

I remember the first film I saw.

It was Last Tango in Paris with Marlon Brando.

It was like being hit over the head!

I couldn�t imagine a film like that could exist.

I felt like I was struck by lightning!

And what a film to start with!

That�s when I realized how far behind the West we were.

"In Romania, capitalism has lived its last day."

The people are the true masters

and will remain masters of their destiny and the riches of the country."

Television went from 20 hours of broadcasting on two channels

to one two- hour broadcast per day.

"Comrade Nicolae Ceausescu�s report,

a theoretical and practical contribution

meant to vigorously drive economic and social life,

is the focus for the whole country."

To cut informative TV broadcasts

and to keep a population of 20 million people,

to keep a whole country in ignorance for years

is an act with very serious long term consequences.

There was a crisis of films in the cinema market,

but at the same time, the audience had a huge appetite for films.

Then VHS films appeared, �video� as we called it.

It felt amazing to do something illegal during Communism,

something not communist.

Watching imperialist movies.

They were all dubbed by the same voice.

Films in English were usually dubbed by Irina Nistor.

The whole country knew her voice,

but no one knew what she looked like.

"Kiss me."

"But you�re sticky."

"So what?"

It�s the most well known voice in Romania after Ceausescu�s.

"When I say, yes?"

"Now."

"Easy."

I really wanted to know what she looked like.

I didn�t even think she had a body.

She was pure consciousness She was �the voice.�

"You work on commission, right?"

"Yes".

"Big mistake!"

"Huge!"

She was an entity.

I imagined her dubbing films in her kitchen, making soup or...

Yeah, you could hear noises.

A brunette with long hair and really strong.

I always had a feeling she was blonde.

Very beautiful. She has this warm voice, a soft tone.

That�s how I saw her...

A feline, a model.

That�s how I imagined Irina Nistor.

Incredibly beautiful.

Divine.

Like a voice from a choir of angels.

In the �80s, I worked as a film translator for Romanian State Television.

I didn�t fit in there.

I didn�t like it. I often had to translate for the Ideological Commission.

It was a censorship committee that decided what to broadcast and what to cut.

"New Jersey, three months earlier."

"Mom, I don�t want to go to school." "Mrs. Wardrobe is impossible."

"I don�t want to discuss this." "No, cut this."

"Mom, we�ll be late."

"Stop!"

"Too much food."

"Products, look, look!"

"What�s the message?" "That the West is a land of prosperity?"

"I don�t think so."

"So we�re cutting this?" "Of course we are."

"Mac, what are you doing?"

To start with, I managed to find a TV.

I paid 20,000 LEI for this color TV.

It was a Sharp TV made in Japan.

The second step was getting a video player.

A video player cost as much as a Dacia car.

It was the equivalent of a new Dacia.

55,000 LEI.

We started around 1985, I think. Yes.

When your husband went to Germany and he brought a video player.

You couldn�t buy a video player in our shops.

They came in the evening, around 20 people at first, young and old.

Then word spread that I was screening films.

By morning I could have around 2,000- 3,000 LEI,

and a monthly salary at the time was 2,000 LEI.

- Video night at Barbu�s.

- What is it? - Something with Chuck Norris.

- What time? - 8:00. See you there.

- I�ll go tell the others.

We�d talk like this... Yes, let�s see a film.

At street corners, whispering. �Hey, can you make it?�

- Evening. Barbu�s showing films tonight.

- Yes? When? - 8:00.

- How�s your mom? - Good, thanks.

- There�s a video night at Barbu�s tonight.

- Come to Barbu�s, he�s showing films tonight.

- Chuck Norris, action films.

- 8:00, at Barbu�s.

So the first film I saw...

was...

in a one- bedroom apartment.

It smelled of mildew, but none of that mattered.

A clock, somewhere in the hallway, ticking.

- What are you doing here? - I�m here for the screening.

- You got money? - I do.

- C�mon.

People had a strong desire to know,

to learn about a society that was forbidden.

We were all breathing in and out at the same time, in the same rhythm.

And when the film started,

we would all savor every image.

Even the credits at the beginning of the film.

Lone Wolf McQuade.

Chuck Norris gets a terrible beating.

And they lock him in his car.

An excavator digs a hole.

And they push him into the hole with the car and cover him.

Then he wakes up, obviously.

And says, �I�ve got to get out of here.�

No panic. No anger. He was in control.

I thought it was real.

I see myself, mouth wide open, eyes peeled.

It�s okay, we�ll make it. Of course I can do it! You can do it!

And he started the car.

And he got out!

- Comrade Nistor.

- Do you have two minutes? - Yes.

One day I was at work and a colleague approached me.

- A comrade is looking for a collaborator.

- He has these new films

and he needs someone talented like you to translate them.

I couldn�t believe he was talking to me where anyone could hear.

- What films?

- New ones.

He mentioned American films and VHS tapes, of course I was immediately intrigued.

It was my only chance to see these movies.

Even if I knew there were risks.

The regime was becoming more suspicious and afraid of sabotage.

So they were using fear,

the psychosis of surveillance,

which made people watch their own behavior.

It made them suspicious of others

and probably made them inform on one another.

- Come in.

We went down to the basement,

which I thought was strange.

- Good evening.

- Good evening.

- I�m Engineer Zamfir. - You must be Irina Nistor.

- Sit down please.

He gave me a test, I had to dub Doctor Zhivago.

- Please put your headphones on.

"Are you the poet?"

"Yes."

"I used to admire your poetry."

"Thank you."

"I shouldn�t admire it anymore." "I should consider it absurdly personal."

- Right?

- Continue.

He seemed stern and very pragmatic. He knew exactly what he wanted.

And it had to be done really quickly, so he could make a decision.

I had no idea how long it was to last, if it was for one film or for more.

I didn�t know.

- What would you like to be paid?

We started to negotiate and I asked for 100 LEI.

That was the price of an Austrian chocolate bar on the black market.

And he said: �No worries, I�ll give you 200!�

"The future belongs to socialism, communism,

to a world without imperialists and capitalists."

Anything on TV was just as awful as the food you could get to eat.

Everyone spoke about the same things,

about the endless lines, about not having anything,

about the struggle to get things.

Everything was rationed, but not by us.

It came from above.

And whether we liked it or not,

we had to dance to their tune.

"Raising the revolutionary, socialist awareness."

We couldn�t talk on the bus, for example, about the amazing films we saw on video.

Because you never knew who was sitting next to you.

It was underground.

Probably for the simple fact

that we were watching something other than what was on TV.

Because what was on TV was clearly just propaganda.

So even if we were watching films with explosions and fights,

it was different from their propaganda.

Action films were fundamental for us boys.

You had all the Chuck Norris films.

Then the Van Damme films.

Like Bloodsport where Frank Dux and Chong Li have an amazing fight.

I think we learned a lot, Rambo was fighting bad men.

Chuck Norris went to save his friends, risking a rat on his head.

The films changed what you thought,

what you were looking for, what you were interested in.

You developed through films.

In Rocky I, he�d wake up at 5:00 AM.

He�d put on that shabby old tracksuit with a hood.

And he�d go out for a run. He�d train.

And little me, who wanted to become big...

I set my alarm for 5:00.

I�m not kidding!

I mixed the eggs. God, it was awful, but I drank it.

I dressed warm like him, to sweat,

took two weights in my hands and went for it.

There was a freshness and novelty...

that influenced you in so many ways.

From seeing the clothes, the attitudes, the gestures...

We all wanted to have Rambo�s knife with the needle and thread and all.

There was a whole life in the video player.

We were watching films on videotape, illegally copied from originals.

They were smuggled in illegally and it was illegal to watch them.

I don�t know where they got them.

There was a group of people who did this.

I don�t know how they got the tapes. People said they were coming on boats.

I would go or send someone to bring new films two or three times a year.

You need courage to get in a car

and drive to get films from an unknown world.

- Open the trunk.

- Take this.

- Get lost!

I had an arrangement with the border patrol

like for cigarette and drug trafficking all over the world.

Not for one moment did I imagine

how big and valuable this would become.

- No, there�s no point discussing this one. - Look at all the meat!

- Next one.

It was yet another endless meeting at the Ideological Commission.

We were watching an episode of Nu, Pogodi!

A Russian animation.

- Wait, stop!

- Rewind that bunny.

- What happened?

- Stop!

- Look, three balloons, red, yellow and blue.

Unfortunately, the bunny was carrying three balloons,

in the exact colors of the Romanian flag.

It had to disappear because it looked like the Russians were controlling Romania.

- What example are we setting for our children? Think of the message.

- We�re cutting it.

It was totally absurd.

Translating for Zamfir, I wasn�t required to censor anything.

I could say �priest.�

�Stinking communist.�

I could say �Easter.�

�God.�

I could name any saint.

�Father Christmas.�

It seemed like a way to be free and to spite the regime.

It was a way to win a battle.

At the time, I felt it made a difference.

She would never translate swear words.

Or anything connected to sex.

People would swear quite a bit and we�d hear �Holy Moly.�

"Motherfucker!" And she�d say: �Go to hell.�

The dirty words were translated as �Go to hell.�

�To hell,� yes. That�s what she said.

No matter what crap they were saying... And also �Get lost.�

"Fuck you!" �Get lost!�

"Fuck you, man!" �Go to hell� or �Get lost.�

He tells her: "You know what, I realize, I love you, I need you, damn, I want to fuck you!"

Irina Nistor says,

�I was thinking, I love you, I need you

and you know what, go to hell!�

"Go to hell!"

"You moron!"

"Get out of my sight, you bacon fat!"

"Get lost!"

"You�re all idiots. You know why?"

There was a secret police agent in the TV station, Comrade Orzan.

We often met in the elevator going to the same place.

We�d go up and I remember each time he�d say...

- I heard you last night.

My stomach was tied in a knot.

Is he going to bring me in? What film did he see?

The one where I said �stinking communist�?

It was the perfect way to keep me on a knife�s edge.

We did everything without the authorities� approval.

I can say it was all done...

quietly, underground.

My parents told me not to talk about our video player in school.

They said it�s better that it should remain a secret, but didn�t explain why.

It was the attitude we all perceived,

to keep it obscure

and not talk about it.

I felt that everything was under surveillance and controlled.

They knew everything, every step you made.

Zamfir suspected everybody of being in the secret police.

He asked me every day, �Are you sure you�re not one of them?�

Irina Nistor was definitely connected or had access to the secret services.

I never doubted that.

Because of the confidence and courage she displayed when dubbing.

She was translating, listening, talking and...

She understood everything! She would have made a great spy.

She could have finished me.

I have to confess I also suspected him.

He had that schooling, that way about him,

the cold politeness you could�ve done without.

"They�re my horses, bastards!"

"Policemen!"

One night Zamfir drove me home.

- What do they want?

And something happened

which made me almost certain that he was in the secret police.

How dare you stop me!

- I am Colonel Zamfir.

- Salute me.

- Yes, sir.

So the policeman backed off in silence.

And I froze and kept my mouth shut.

When he got back into the car he said...

- Why are you smiling?

To be honest, I didn�t want to know if Zamfir was in the secret police.

I took advantage.

It happened a few times.

But I could never have been a Colonel.

Come on, a beat officer,

I could�ve told him anything and he�d buy it.

I had special license plates, always wore a suit and tie.

Also my age helped, so yes,

I took advantage and I lied.

"Esteemed viewers,

today, in the Palace Hall of the Romanian Socialist Republic,

the National Conference of the Romanian Communist Party has begun,

a highly important and significant moment for the party and the country."

Romania was closed at the time, people weren�t allowed passports.

Every year the situation deteriorated, the political pressure intensified.

The divide between the regime and the people was growing.

I think the regime was afraid of spontaneous assembly.

That�s what�s dangerous.

In an organized assembly, certain topics come up.

In spontaneous assembly, the topics are free.

There�s this joke, a guy is on the bus with a bag

and he keeps shaking it.

People say �What�s in there?� He says, �Mice.�

�What are you doing?� �I�m not letting them organize.�

For regular people, video nights were...

I don�t know, the one thing that helped us survive.

As teenagers, everything we knew about pop culture and films

came from watching illegal videocassettes.

You�d stop following the film

because you were so impressed by the houses,

by the shops packed with food and sweets, wow!

Just the fact that you could see a car that you�d never see here.

There was no way you�d see a Lamborghini on the street.

For women, it was an inspiration for fashion.

They�d see the latest fashions from elsewhere.

We didn�t have any TV shows about fashion.

Not knowing what it was like there, we were hungry for films

that took place in New York or in Acapulco, like the Elvis films,

or in Paris.

We craved them and marveled at the landscape and streets,

rather than the action, many times.

I was astonished, �Look at the apartments Americans have, incredible!�

�Look how big their cars are, the streets!�

It was a window into the West from which I could see what the free world was like.

- Police! What are you doing here?

One Thursday night, eight policemen came.

They started to scream and yell.

- No one leaves! - We�re arresting you! We�ll...

- C�mon, sit down!

- What�s this, Comrade?

- I was watching a film with some friends.

- A film? Is this a video screening?

- Did you take some money tonight?

- No, but what�s the problem? - What�s the problem?

- Hey, take the VCR.

- We�re taking the VCR, Comrade Barbu.

I said, �Okay, but do you have a search warrant?�

And they were like, �Listen to this guy. He wants a search warrant.�

- Okay, we�ll get it. In half an hour, we�ll be back with a search warrant.

And then we�ll rip your home apart.

They could press criminal charges and sentence you to one or two years in jail.

In my case, they took the VCR and 30 tapes.

People who had VCRs and color TVs suffered a lot of injustice.

One evening, he simply showed up there.

I didn�t know who he was or where he came from.

All I knew was that he was very polite.

- And you are? - Mircea.

- I was recommended.

- Are you usually late?

- No, I�m really sorry, it won�t happen again.

- Are they ready?

- Yes.

- Here they are.

- He�s our new translator.

- Good evening. - Comrade Nistor, it�s an honor.

- You will have different schedules so you won�t meet often.

- This is the dubbing table. - I�ll leave the tapes there.

- The lists are there. Yes?

- I understand.

- Good, follow me.

He was a character that I completely ignored.

He didn�t interest me. He was the competition, to begin with.

Strangely, I don�t interact with people. I don�t feel the need.

You need to understand that I was there...

to be Mrs. Irina�s backup.

Quite a hard task!

There were very few tapes dubbed by someone else.

So we�d say, �Wait a minute. This is not an original.�

Yes.

�This is a fake. Bring me the original!�

There were other voices. There was a guy.

"I am Michael Knight."

"David told me to come here."

"My wife, Terry."

I don�t remember the other person.

I didn�t like it. I couldn�t enjoy the film itself.

Seriously, it felt like something was missing.

I only remember Irina Nistor. There was someone else!

"Should I tell you something? What?"

I�d miss Irina.

We�d reject a different voice, I don�t want this guy

We�ve been conned.

Irina�s voice was the original.

"First there was a true collapse of civilization".

"And then genocide."

We�d watch four films a night.

Around 5:00 AM, we�d all be confused.

You wouldn�t remember on Monday what you saw exactly.

Wait a second. Was this in Rambo 2 or Rambo 4?

When did he sew his wound?

And the explosion... Wait, he wasn�t in Vietnam anymore.

Nobody knew anymore.

The girl the husband wants to kill...

She had a twin sister and... She�s thrown to the crocodiles...

And she comes back disfigured. My mom and her friend were crying.

The copies were so bad, that many times we had to imagine what was on screen.

Copied over and over but not from a master.

The quality deteriorated exponentially.

You�d think the VCR was broken, but it was the faulty tapes.

"Speak, speak!"

"What�s your name?"

Within 24 hours, the films had entered Romania,

were translated, multiplied

and then sold throughout the country.

Then smaller local dealers would take over,

and copy them again and again.

They�d reach us with very poor quality of image and sound.

- We�re making a very small modification. - The price will now be double.

- Why? - It�s double.

New films, better quality...

- Look at the tapes.

- Look at them.

Slowly it grew bigger, but that would be an understatement.

�Lieutenants� from all the big cities came to get tapes.

I knew that every other Monday I�d come to my distributors in Bucharest.

Then I�d distribute the tapes to friends and acquaintances

in Bistrita, Oradea, Satu Mare.

- Evening, Mr. Zamfir.

- All good? - Yes.

And for me it was a great business.

The average monthly income was 2,000, and I made 500 a night.

- See you next week. - Yes, goodbye.

So the network spread from A to Z,

everybody making a bit of money.

Risky money, because no laws sanctioned it.

Mr. Zamfir started out with two, three or five VCRs.

By the end, he had 360 VCRs.

Each tape cost 1,000 LEI back then.

And every three hours, he�d make 300 tapes, 300,000 LEI.

The value of a house!

Nobody could have done this except for Mr. Zamfir.

Nobody!

"Sit down! But..."

"Sit down!"

Zamfir�s house was an exclusively male space.

And the people who came there

to buy tapes and talk about God knows what, were all men.

I didn�t talk to them. I didn�t want to know their names.

For years, I had no idea what Zamfir�s first name was,

nor Mircea�s surname.

I did my own thing. I went there, I dubbed, I left.

- Hi, you have the tape? - Yes.

- Thanks, bye!

- I got the film.

- What film?

- Missing in Action with Chuck Norris.

These Americans were being held hostage by the Vietnamese.

I saw the film.

He�s captured by the...

�Gooks.�

I think that�s what Irina said. Yeah, the Gooks.

�Bloody Gook!�

And to torture him, they put a sack over his head with a rat in it.

To Chuck Norris. Big mistake!

They expected he�d be eaten by the rat.

They took it off.

He�d eaten it. Norris had the rat in his mouth.

He didn�t really eat it, he bit it.

The rat�s dead and he spits it out.

Chuck Norris spits out the rat.

And it was that whole thing of ultimate survival.

After the film ended...

- Let�s see what you�ve got.

- Come on then, I�ll destroy you.

The street wasn�t just a street, a rock not just a rock.

They were challenges.

- Come on.

- Bring it on.

We started to play in a disciplined manner.

We started to want to be...

heroes.

In my flat, I screened the film...

Nero.

I couldn�t help myself and I made a few comments.

And even my aunt, who was 70 years old, said,

- Look, he�s just like Ceausescu. He set Rome on fire.

- The same way Ceausescu destroyed churches and villages,

Nero set Rome on fire.�

I was at my aunt�s one early evening...

and I was watching a karate film on my own.

A family of neighbors, university professors,

but who were notorious party activists and militants,

had filed a complaint.

- Yes? - Mrs. Urse?

- Yes. - Officer Dinu Popescu.

- Is something wrong?

- Come with us.

- I�ll just get my coat.

My aunt was called in by the secret police.

She was so scared

that she was told not even to tell me what had happened.

- Who is it?

- Cristi, come with me.

All of a sudden, two men in black came.

They looked like characters in a crime film.

I was very scared.

My parents locked me in a room for a couple of hours.

It�s such a strange experience.

I wasn�t sure what was happening.

But it happened all of a sudden

and out of the blue.

It was over.

They confiscated the video player and tapes.

And I never watched films at my aunt�s again.

"The people and the youth.

They are the ones who have achieved everything

in the socialist development of our country.

They are the heroes that should be sung in films, theater, poetry,

in art, literature, paintings, all artistic domains.

They need to be represented."

Political strategies of repression were getting harsher.

You could feel it at all levels.

More people were questioned by the secret police.

It was an increasingly repressive time.

- Call in Irina Nistor.

- I was afraid because he hadn�t called me in before.

- Come in.

- Hello. - Take a seat.

- I was trying not give him the satisfaction of seeing me scared.

- What were you thinking dubbing Jesus of Nazareth?

- People loved them. - Yes.

- For instance, during Jesus of Nazareth,

when they watched the crucifixion, they would really cry.

- They would cry!

- You�d see them with handkerchiefs

and they lived every moment!

It was the time when Ceausescu was demolishing churches.

You couldn�t go to church without being denounced.

�I saw you going to church.�

- I translated a film...

- No, Comrade Nistor. It�s a religious film.

- I thought freedom of religion was a constitutional right?

That made him angry.

- You�re teaching me about the Constitution?

- But I don�t know what the problem is.

I didn�t know what was coming.

- You don�t realize the seriousness of your actions.

- You know how often you said �God� instead of �the one above�?

- You know who watched this film and complained? Do you know?

- Get out!

I was really scared.

I felt for the first time that the end could be near.

Maybe I should�ve quit then, but I couldn�t. The films were my oxygen.

"Think you�ll get away with it?" "You can�t kill policemen."

After that, every time I dubbed a film,

I wondered if I�d be called in.

"You think you�ll get away with it?"

"He�ll come after us."

"Help!"

"Help!"

The main feeling was, �I can watch films!

I can keep in touch with the world.�

"Look! It�s him. What will we do?"

The adrenaline rush was amazing. To be able to watch and translate.

"You are absolute idiots." "You want to know why?"

And I couldn�t stop at all.

"Because I want to honor you."

It was like a drug, like escaping from jail.

"You need people like me."

At least six films.

The average was seven or eight. Once I managed to dub 10 in a row.

"Teach me, I can do it!"

Films, like books,

were the pretext, as it were,

for communication between people.

The reason is simple. We all watched the same films.

"People of Eurasia."

"Until the final victory has been achieved."

It was also a way to provoke the authorities.

All these films were a way to rebel, to do something forbidden.

We were subversive, even if we were only watching a film on VCR.

"Ten-four, come in."

"It�s the trucker frequency."

"So it�s their dialect?"

These people were the resistance!

How did they survive?

Where did they record the tapes?

How did they manage to hide it,

everything they were doing?

How come nobody caught them?

"Devon is calling."

I was dubbing.

"Put the call through."

"I�ll drive."

Suddenly, they burst in.

"Hello, Michael."

- How dare you barge in! Who are you?

- Take your hands off me! Take them off!

- Your name, Comrade. - Zamfir. Who sent you?

- Is there anyone else in the house?

- Take your hands off me.

- I�ll find out who sent you.

- Quiet down. - I�ll even find out your mother�s name.

- How dare you talk like that!

It was a scary moment which could�ve ended tragically.

But a magic word,

a password...

made them leave.

That�s how I found out Mircea was an undercover secret police officer.

Mr. Zamfir never asked me any questions.

I never asked for anything at all.

That�s honor.

- Good evening.

I didn�t know why they looked so shaken up.

They didn�t tell me what had happened.

Maybe they were afraid I�d be scared.

Later on, I heard about the raid and why the secret police didn�t stop Zamfir then.

But saving Zamfir

put Mircea in a delicate situation with his superiors.

So Zamfir decided to try bribing the high officials

to get them both off the hook.

- Comrade Zamfir.

- Evening.

- Let�s sit down and talk.

All these powerful men

were manipulated by the needs of their wives and children.

They didn�t realize that when taking films from me,

their betrayal of communist ethics and morals ceased to exist.

He�s an excellent businessman.

It was a very smart move

to give high- ranking officials tapes for free.

It�s like the story of the goose that lays the golden egg.

You don�t kill it.

Because you�re left without the golden egg.

Mr. Zamfir became so rich that no one could touch him, nobody!

He worked with people of higher rank, above Colonels.

From the army, the secret police, the police,

the Central Committee, people of very high rank and power.

The rest, he�d just ignore.

- Comrade Zamfir, I was just trying to help.

- I brought you the video player.

- I have my own.

- That�s for work, for the others. - You know who you�re talking to, right?

Who could stop me, when everyone had an interest?

Once the Attorney General came and said: �You think you�re above it all?�

I said no.

He tried to threaten me.

- Mr. Zamfir!

- Take your VCR, call the car and leave!

I knew there was nothing he could do.

Because they all benefited from my work, the political class at the highest level.

The secret services, the police.

What could an Attorney General do to me?

Among those who tried hard to get tapes from me

was Ceausescu�s son, Comrade Ceausescu�s son.

I gave him everything he wanted, but I refused to meet him.

Those were my glory days.

If the video tapes didn�t exist,

if Irina Nistor didn�t exist...

I don�t know, because it�s such an important part of that era.

"Get out of my face!"

She had the voice...

and she could also communicate the actors� emotions.

I was shocked by how original her voice was.

It was shrill and yet very pleasant and expressive.

"Wait, this is not charity work."

It felt like she�d always been there. She was there!

She didn�t just dub, she also acted.

There were many characters, men, women and she acted them all.

And she also made comments.

The guy said �Hello� and she�d make her own additions

to give more color to the character.

She became like an acquaintance or a friend.

She had a certain image, not a physical image, a figure.

But she had a certain presence.

"Teach me. I can do it."

"You are not Japanese." "You are not a Tanaka."

"How will Santa Claus come" "if we don�t have a chimney?"

"You�ll see!"

"Why?"

"To honor you."

I counted them, multiplied them,

and by 1989, I had translated around 3,000 films.

The Man with the Deadly Lens.

The Godfather. Look, Cotton Club!

The Deer Hunter. Kung Fu 2.

Ninja, of course!

The Shining. Jaws 2.

Death Cruise, imagine that! Rough Cut.

Later on people told me that it gave them courage,

that they associated my voice with the idea of freedom

and the idea of hope.

And this of course made me feel flattered and happy.

It�s that amazing feeling that you haven�t lived for nothing.

That you�ve accomplished something during a very complex time

when it seemed almost impossible.

"The 15th round."

"You�re going down."

"No way."

It�s very hard to explain

or to understand why they didn�t stop it.

Were they just reckless? Or were they incompetent?

I don�t know.

The high-ranking secret police were the most interested in the tapes.

They didn�t think it would become a mass phenomenon.

They believed it was just a closed circle.

Ceausescu probably didn�t know the extent of the phenomenon.

He thought it was just trustworthy people from the Central Committee

who watched capitalist films.

And they wouldn�t be affected

because they had healthy views on our society.

Nobody informed him, because they all wanted to watch films.

Nobody was going to say, �Comrade Ceausescu...

in Bucharest there are 10,000 video players.�

- Freedom! Freedom! Freedom!

In the end, the whole thing exploded.

And those seeds of freedom,

also planted by those video films,

grew.

During the revolution, everybody was in the streets.

Because they all knew there was a better life out there.

How?

From films.

- Down with the party! Down with the party!

-I am theater director Alexa Visarion.

- In the name of the Romanian people, and in the name of their ideals,

the government will now resign.

- The people are with us!

- In five minutes, we will make an announcement

- to the entire Romanian nation, to the heroic Romanian people.

- We won! We won!

A lot of people asked: �Why didn�t you stop? Weren�t you afraid?�

But giving up seemed cowardly to me, to tell you the truth.

I just wanted to watch films.

And it was a really unexpected opportunity to watch films.

People need stories, no?

In 1992, this activity started to die.

Mr. Zamfir had extraordinary flair.

He sold all the equipment at exactly the right moment.

But it was the end of an era.

For me it was...

an opportunity to learn some amazing things,

to observe a great man.

And to this day, I haven�t met...

a man like Mr. Zamfir.

During a dictatorship which had controlled everything,

they lost control of something that seemed insignificant,

the videotape.

The videotapes set the whole communist system off balance.

It�s because they were deemed trivial, that they had such a big impact.

The tapes are here. Look how they are preserved.

Here they are.

Look at them.

Look.

"I know it�s tempting" "to use physical violence."

"I know that."

That�s her.