This story first appeared in a special CineEurope 2016 issue of BoxOffice magazine. To subscribe to the magazine click here.

Name: Marynia Gierat
Company: Kino Pod Baranami
Title: Owner/Manager
Country: Poland

Marynia Gierat owns and runs what is arguably Poland’s most innovative art-house cinema. Kraków’s Kino Pod Baranami (literally: Cinema Under the Rams) has both been named Polish Cinema of the Year by the Polish Film Institute and European Cinema of the Year by Europa Cinemas.

Gierat jokes that she is “sentenced to cinema” and “had no choice, since she’s always lived in a cinema.” Her parents ran Krakow’s Kino Wanda cinema (no Chinese connection!). There she met great Polish filmmakers such as Krzysztof Kie?lowski and Agnieszka Holland, but also Hollywood legends like Robert De Niro.

She has introduced both baby cinema (“Rams in Nappies’), Older Screenings (for 50-plus) and of course lots of events aimed at students. Gierat runs the cinema together with her mother Bo?ena, whom she credits as a major influence.

In addition to her cinema Gierat is also very active in Europa Cinemas and speaker at events such as Arthouse Convergence. Admitting that she is a workaholic, she says that her passion for cinema is a “harmless and very pleasant genetic disorder,” so much so that she cannot even picture herself in any other job.