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The Legend of the Suram Fortress

The Legend of the Suram Fortress

(Ambavi Suramis tsikhitsa)

Sergueï Paradjanov, Dodo Abachidze

  • 1985
  • USSR
  • Fantasy
  • 1h28mn
  • Original version with French subtitles
  • Color
In ancient times. On the border between Turkey and Georgia, they’re building a fortress in Suram. It won’t be completed until a man is walled in alive in the construction.
Imprisoned for several years, reduced to silence by soviet justice for 15 more years, Parajanov returned to make The Legend of the Suram Fortress, co-directed with his faithful friend Dodo Abashidze, with support from the Georgian Communist party’s first secretary, Edouard Chevardnadze. A simple commission for the glory of Georgia blossoms into a stupefying series of magical scenes, mostly hypnotic still shots. A collage genius, Parajanov applies his techniques to film, inciting the viewer to assemble the fragments to find meaning, or to just be bewitched. Paradjanov’s cinema can be dreamt as well as watched.

Kirill Serebrennikov

If we talk about great authors of world cinema, then Parajanov certainly stands among them. Parajanov is an artist, a poet who addresses the audience, not in the usual narrative way, but through visual forms and images. These images are always striking, emotional, significant and paradoxical. In many ways, it’s the absolute visual film. An explosion of color, an explosion of fantasy and images that burn into us, forever. The list of films Parajanov couldn’t shoot is unjustly longer than the list of those he could. In the last few years, many books and articles have been published featuring his unknown, forbidden or lost scripts, with explanations. There’s a whole community of Parajanov fans and connoisseurs. Bit by bit, they collect the artifacts from Parajanov’s world: collages, apocryphal documents, drawings, letters. Next year is Parajanov’s centenary, and, of course, nowadays all this is just as important as his completed famous films.

My favorite Parajanov film, The Color of Pomegranates, was previously shown at the festival. So this year we’ll see The Legend of the Suram Fortress - a film that says that all beauty calls for cruelty, and often blood and human sacrifice.

Sergei Parajanov’s whole life was a sacrifice meant to make the world more beautiful.

Screenings

06/09 • 18h00 • Screen 100

Credits

  • With : Veriko Anjaparidze, Tamari Tsitsishvili, Dudukhana Tserodze, Dodo Abachidze, Sofiko Chiaureli
  • Screenplay : Vaja Gigashvili, from the novel by Daniel Chonqadze
  • Photography : Yuriy Klimenko
  • Editing : Marfa Ponomarenko
  • Music by : Jansug Kakhidze
  • Production : Sergo Sikharulidze