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Tickets will be available through the American Cinematheque website.
The Legend of Suram Fortress
Georgia, 1985
Sergei Parajanov spent the majority of the 1970s and early 1980s incarcerated. Imprisoned twice by Soviet authorities for crimes of homosexuality (the filmmaker was bisexual) as well as fabricated charges, Parajanov found support from filmmakers across the film world: Antonioni, Bertolucci, Demy, Fellini, Godard, Leone, Pasolini, Rivette, Rossellini, Tati, Truffaut, Varda and Visconti among others publicly called for his release. But it took a direct appeal from Surrealist poet Louis Aragon to Brezhnev for Parajanov’s release from his first stint across several “strict regime” labor colonies. No longer allowed to reside in Kyiv, Parajanov returned to his family home in Tbilisi and was subsequently offered an opportunity to direct by Georgia Film Studio. Adapting a formative Georgian folktale about the repeated attempts to build a redoubt in the country’s hilly Shida Kartli region, Parajanov’s film is another sumptuously textured opus. Infused with Turkish and Persian motifs, the film’s tale of prophecy and sacrifice unspools across ravishing ellipses.
DCP, color, in Georgian with English subtitles, 89 min. Director: Sergei Parajanov, David (Dodo) Abashidze. Screenwriter: Vazha Gigashvili. Based on the novel by Daniel Chonkadze and other sources. With: Sofiko Chiaureli, David Abashidze, Zurab Kipshidze.
Arabesques on the Theme of Pirosmani
Georgia, 1985
Commissioned by the Georgian Studio of Popular-Science and Documentary Films, Parajanov’s meditation on self-taught Georgian folk painter Niko Pirosmani also evokes the cosmopolitan atmosphere of early 20th century Tbilisi.
DCP, color, in Russian and Georgian with English subtitles, 20 min. Director: Sergei Parajanov. Screenwriter: Cora Tsereteli. With: Alexander Janshiev, Leila Alibegashvili.
