Upon hearing Marin Karmitz’ name, a critic who puts cinema in the centre of his/her life and loves to watch films in a movie theatre is immediately reminded of the films of Godard, Chabrol, Resnais, Ripstein, Kieslowski, Kiarostami and Yılmaz Güney’s The Wall. Thanks to his multi-faceted personality, the question of “who is Marin Karmitz” can be replied with more than one gratifying answer. A director, producer, distributor... But the reply to the question “which one of his achievements is the dearest,” is singular: “He changed the concept of the business of operating a film theatre in the world.” Marin Karmitz, who reclaimed the box-office potential of films outside of the popular, mainstream films, is a pioneer in art-house film distribution. His company MK2, which carries his initials, is the owner of a prestigious chain of 12 film theatres with a total of 65 screens. This powerful and respected persona, who operates in every aspect of film production and distribution, was educated at IDHEC–the best film school in France at the time. He worked as a cameraman and a producer and made short films. When he couldn’t get these films distributed, he decided to take risks as an investor. He opened his first movie theatre in the Bastille neighbourhood with the motto “working classes should not go to see films to be numbed by taking refuge in escapist films.” Today, we know that commercial concerns cause more censorship than political oppression. The biggest obstacle for creativity is auto-censoring in order to appeal to the common denominator. Marin Karmitz is one of the patrons of cinema who helped it reach the audience in all its genres and styles. One should think how art-house and uncensored films would be distributed in France without him and how audiences would reach these films if there were no art-house theatres in other countries which followed his example. We cannot imagine a history of cinema without Karmitz, just as we cannot imagine it without Truffaut. – Alin Taşçıyan