A reappraisal of realism has risen to the fore. Sparked by the demise of cinema’s ontological basis (the existential link between film’s corporeal nature and its real-world referent) and the renewed pertinence of Bazin’s cardinal question, Qu’est-ce que le cinéma?, realism has been re-framed as a generative area of study in a parlous digital age, enabling new (or newly situated) discourse on cinematic reportage, authenticity, and representation. Recent scholars who have embraced realism’s epistemological subscription—yet managed to traverse the epistemic fissure of a positivist approach—have recognized moments of contingency in contemporary art house and marginal cinemas, rooted either in classical tenets (spatiotemporal integrity, social extension, moral despondence) or emergent ones (“haptic” visuality, profilmic exclusivity, ethical engagement). This issue of Cinephile is situated at the intersection of such discussions.