Paradjanov the Magician
“If Paradjanov’s films belong to any international film genre, this might be termed the ethnographic-ecstatic, a genre in which every ritual plays an important role, magic is taken seriously, and national or regional folk myth is the major source of inspiration.”
--Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader
From August 2 through 24, the Gene Siskel Film Center presents a retrospective of Sergei Paradjanov, a director both revered and persecuted for his deliriously sensual vision. This series includes a new print of the director’s masterpiece SHADOWS OF OUR FORGOTTEN ANCESTORS, as well as 35mm prints of three of his earliest features, ANDREISH, THE FIRST LAD, and UKRAINIAN RHAPSODY, never before screened in Chicago.
Paradjanov was born in 1924 into an Armenian family in Soviet Georgia, and was trained as a director at the Institute of Cinematography in Moscow. Serving an apprenticeship at Ukraine’s Kiev Studios, where he made five films including the supremely mature SHADOWS OF OUR FORGOTTEN ANCESTORS, he experienced his first harsh run-in with Soviet authorities. SHADOWS won multiple festival prizes and international acclaim for its rapturous exoticism, but at home the director was charged with fueling Ukrainian nationalism.
Paradjanov faced a four-year struggle to make his next film, THE COLOR OF POMEGRANATES, set in his native city of Tbilisi. This astonishingly ritualized evocation of the life of 18th-century Armenian poet/troubadour Sayat Nova once again resulted in government censure. Charged with a host of offenses including illegal currency dealings, homosexuality, and “incitement to suicide,” he was sentenced to eleven years in prison.
In 1982, under government surveillance, poverty-stricken, his career in shambles but his spirit unbroken, Paradjanov made THE LEGEND OF SURAM FORTRESS, a film even more timely today for its tale of religious fervor that divides the Christian and Muslim worlds. Achieving a small measure of freedom under glasnost, he made ASHIK KERIB, the final finished film of his career. The story of a minstrel who undertakes a dangerous quest to secure the hand of his beloved could be interpreted as a metaphor for the life of a filmmaker pursuing his art into the perilous jaws of politics.
Special thanks to Jessica Rosner and Kino International for advice and cooperation.
--Barbara Scharres
Saturday double-bill discount!
Buy a ticket for the first Paradjanov film on Aug. 2, 9, or 16, and get a ticket for the second Paradjanov film that day at this discount rate (tickets must be purchased at the same time): General Admission $7; Students $5; Members $4.
ANDREISH
1954, Sergei Paradjanov and Yakov Bazelyan, USSR, 63 min.
With Giuli Chokhonelidze, Konstantin Russu
PARADJANOV: A REQUIEM
1994, Ron Holloway, USA/Germany, 57 min.
Long unavailable (along with early films THE FIRST LAD and UKRANIAN RHAPSODY), Paradjanov’s first feature ANDREISH, expanded from his student film A MOLDAVIAN TALE, provides a glimpse of the mythic and folkloric themes that were to become his trademark. A shepherd boy earns manhood by battling a demon. In Russian with English subtitles. 35mm.
Paradjanov dominates the portrait PARADJANOV: A REQUIEM with a larger-than-life presence, providing unprecedented insight into his oeuvre. Critic Ron Holloway interweaves revealing interviews with a dazzling array of film clips from major works as well as shorts and unfinished pieces, for an enjoyably comprehensive overview of the director’s world. In English and Russian with English subtitles. 16mm. (BS)
Saturday, August 2, 5:00 pm
Sunday, August 3, 3:00 pm
ASHIK KERIB
1988, Sergei Paradjanov and Dodo Abashidze, USSR, 73 min.
With Sofiko Chiaureli, Ramaz Chkhikvadze
“A visual feast, a rapturously strange, eccentric fairy tale…a most extraordinary film.”--Michael Wilmington, Los Angeles Times
Paradjanov rises to new heights of visual extravagance, transforming a story by Russian poet Mikhail Lermontov into an exotic tale with a dark side. An impoverished Turkish minstrel is granted a thousand days to earn the hand of his reluctant beloved. Making his way through the ancient ruins of a wildly beautiful Armenia, he encounters all that is good and bad in the world before he is saved by the magic of his art. In Georgian and Azeri with English subtitles. 35mm. (BS)
Saturday, August 23, 3:15 pm
Sunday, August 24, 3:15 pm
THE COLOR OF POMEGRANATES
(SAYAT NOVA)
1969, Sergei Paradjanov, USSR, 88 min.
With Melkon Aleksanyan, Vilen Galstyan
“Eye-catching…hypnotic…sharply surreal.”--Janet Maslin, The New York Times
The life of Armenian troubadour Sayat Nova comes in for hallucinatory treatment in a lavish spectacle considered by many to be one of the great works of world cinema. Haunting metaphors and lush visual poetry evoke a host of references, from dreams to Byzantine mosaics, but Soviet officials saw rabid Armenian nationalism and the director was sentenced to a maximum security prison on charges including the ludicrous “incitement to suicide.” In Armenian with English subtitles. 35mm. (BS)
Saturday, August 9, 3:15 pm
Thursday, August 14, 6:00 pm
THE FIRST LAD
(aka THE TOP GUY)
(PERVYY PAREN)
1958, Sergei Paradjanov, USSR, 86 min.
With Lyudmila Sosyura
THE FIRST LAD is one of five films Paradjanov made during his early sojourn at Ukraine’s Kiev Studios under the influence of his mentor Alexander Dovzhenko. The director let his imagination run riot, paying lip service to social realism but delivering a bizarre musical story of love rivalry on a collective farm so lush and over-the-top that it borders on parody. In Russian with English subtitles. 35mm. (BS)
Saturday, August 9, 5:00 pm
Sunday, August 10, 3:15 pm
THE LEGEND OF SURAM FORTRESS
(AMBAVI SURAMIS TSIKHITSA)
1984, Sergei Paradjanov and Dodo Abashidze, USSR, 89 min.
With Veriko Andjaparidze, Tamari Tsitsishvili
“A medieval spectacle…as if an Oldenburg happening had been staged at the court of Harun Al-Rashid.”--J. Hoberman, Village Voice
In a narrative inspired by a Russian folk tale and adapted from a novella by Daniel Chongadze, Paradjanov conjures up the cultural clash between East and West through sublime visions and dizzying detours. Set in the Middle Ages, evoked with an exotic swirl of artifacts, including tapestries, drapes, dolls, picture frames, beads, and icons from the director’s own collection, the film portrays the life of Osman-Agha, a Georgian forced to renounce Christianity to become a Muslim. In Georgian with English subtitles. 35mm. (BS)
Saturday, August 16, 3:15 pm
Monday, August 18, 6:15 pm
New print!
SHADOWS OF OUR FORGOTTEN ANCESTORS
(TINI ZABUTYKH PREDKIV)
1964, Sergei Paradjanov, USSR, 97 min.
With Ivan Nikolaichuk, Larisa Kadochnikova
“Intoxicating...One of the supreme works of Soviet sound cinema.”--Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader
Georgian-born director Sergei Paradjanov is one of the great mavericks of cinema history. Widely considered his masterpiece, SHADOWS is a work of such startling originality that it exposed Paradjanov (who completed just three more features) to Soviet persecution for the rest of his career. Combining folklore, ethnography, and rapturous camerawork, it relates the poignant romance of two young lovers from feuding families in the rugged Carpathian region of the Ukraine. In Ukrainian with English subtitles. 35mm. (MR)
Saturday, August 2, 3:00 pm
Tuesday, August 5, 6:15 pm
UKRAINIAN RHAPSODY
(UKRAINSKAYA RAPSODIYA)
1961, Sergei Paradjanov, 88 min.
With Oksana Petrenko, E. Koshman
Paradjanov brings a characteristically bravura vision to this story of a village girl who rises to fame after winning a vocal competition. Set against the backdrop of WWII, the tale’s sunny, flamboyant visuals have a distinctly non-Soviet flavor that signaled the director’s increasing divergence from the tenets of social realism. In Russian with English subtitles. 35mm. (BS)