Why Do They Write on Walls? (2022)

Storyline

Going through the most important moments of Romania's recent history, a corporate employee becomes a documentary film director and meets the most important representatives of the graffiti and street art phenomenon. The director turns into an active character and becomes the viewer's personal guide through the gullies of urban culture, experiencing the raw sensations that graffers and street artists have when they draw in the public space.
Started as an objective analysis of this subculture, the film becomes a direct transformative experience for its author, constantly presenting a parallel between the world the director comes from and the world he discovers.
In addition to ageneral subjective overviewof the street art scene in Romania, the viewer is taken on a personal journey of a young man in search of his own voice. Each encounter with a graffer or street artist adds a new layer to the personal uncertainty, whilst providing room for reconstruction.
The archive materials serve the purpose of faithfully illustrating the atmosphere within the movement over the past 30 years. All the dimensions and specificities of this subculture are explored in the movie - from the intervention on subways, trams, trains, going toillegal actions on the streets, in the public space, or in abandoned places.
Even though the film begins as an attempt to answer the question "Why do they write on walls?", the whole experience becomes intimate and adds an area of ​​introspection. The way in which the random letters and drawings that we encounter every day in the public space impact each of us is addressed and special attention is given to the changes that can occur in us when we look with an open mind at those who are generally considered "vandals and thugs".
In the end, the director decides to completely change his life, inspired and empowered by the people he encountered and the experiences he lived during the making of the documentary. From this point of view, the film is a coming-of-age story of a 35-year-old man.