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The life of the Armenian poet Sayat-Nova, from childhood to death: his spiritual journey, artistic endeavors, and inner conflicts within the cultural and historical context of Armenia. Hailed as revolutionary by Mikhail Vartanov. (NR, 78 min.)
(TBD)
Essential Arthouse: This monthly series showcases “essential arthouse” films everyone should see on the big screen. Arthouse is a film genre which encompasses films where the content and style – often artistic or experimental – adhere with as little compromise as possible to the filmmakers’ personal artistic vision. This series is Free for Members.
A breathtaking fusion of poetry, ethnography, and cinema, Sergei Parajanov’s masterwork overflows with unforgettable images and sounds. In a series of tableaux that blend the tactile with the abstract, The Color of Pomegranates revives the splendors of Armenian culture through the story of the eighteenth-century troubadour Sayat-Nova, charting his intellectual, artistic, and spiritual growth through iconographic compositions rather than traditional narrative. The film’s tapestry of folklore and metaphor departed from the realism that dominated the Soviet cinema of its era, leading authorities to block its distribution, with rare underground screenings presenting it in a restructured form. This edition features the cut closest to Parajanov’s original vision, in a restoration that brings new life to one of cinema’s most enigmatic meditations on art and beauty. [Janus]
The Color of Pomegranates was restored by The Film Foundation’s World Cinema Project and the Cineteca di Bologna, in association with the National Cinema Centre of Armenia and Gosfilmofond of Russia, and funded by the Material World Charitable Foundation.
Starring: Sofiko Chiaureli, Melkon Alekyan, Vilen Galstyan
Director: Sergei Parajanov
Language: Armenian, Georgian
Genre: Biography, Drama, History, Music
"A dazzling achievement."
— Matt Brunson, Film Frenzy
"A madly beautiful, often straight-up-bonkers meditation on the life of its eponymous Armenian-Azeri balladeer and poet."
— John Patterson, L.A. Weekly
"The Color of Pomegranates serves as an astonishing introduction to one of the cinema's very greatest masters, Sergei Paradjanov."
— Adrian Martin
"The visual tapestry of The Color of Pomegranates, set to the spoken poetry of Sayat-Nova, is what makes it unforgettable as a surrealist anomaly."
— Nicholas Bell, IONCINEMA.com
"It feels at once specific to a certain time—presumably that of its subject, 18th-century Armenian poet Sayat-Nova—but still timeless, either of all time or none with which we’d be familiar."
— Kat Sachs, Chicago Reader
"One may approach it as an achievement of creativity, as an historical film, as a religious film, or even as a political film; in any case, it's rich cinematic ground for those who wish to explore unconventional art."
— Benjamin Wang, Film Inquiry
"What Parajanov did was to stylize the poet’s world, literally visualizing his imagery, radically simplifying the story of his life, and totally dispensing with any framing or narration. . . . In Parajanov’s hands, the effect was as rich and strange as any film by Kenneth Anger or Derek Jarman."
— Ian Christie, Criterion
"In ‘68 the rulebook was still burning and a new language was being written on every movie screen. "Sayat Nova" found a bold new way to tell a man's story, by bouncing his words off of perfectly assembled images like sonar. Human beings, fabric, paint, food, animals and kinetic violence are placed together in sensual decoupage, while the soundtrack seems to sing to itself."
— Scout Tafoya, RogerEbert.com
"It achieves a sort of visionary para-surrealism through the most economical means of gesture, props, and texture. Only 75 minutes, it's a series of linked tableaux—strange marvels in stone churches, punctuated by primitive bits of camera magic. Paradjanov's compositions are astonishing, and no one has ever made the olive-and-orange tones of Soviet color s tock look better. A sublime and heartbreaking film, Sayat Nova alone could justify the entire Film Festival."
— J. Hoberman, The Village Voice
