Repentance
The Most Important Art: a late Soviet cinema playlist from Ian Christie
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2h 31m
Directed by Tengiz Abuladze • 1987 • USSR/Georgia
Tengiz Abuladze’s black comic allegory – the first instance of a Soviet filmmaker directly confronting the legacy of Stalin’s purges – caused a sensation when it first aired on Georgian television. Unfolding over two timelines, the film combines absurdist parable with wrenching drama. When the corpse of the recently deceased mayor of a small town is repeatedly disinterred, its citizens must face up to the horrors of their buried past. Abuladze’s poetic film is a powerful act of cinematic testimony, combining religious symbolism with knowing references to the various ghosts of 20th-century totalitarianism.
REPENTANCE • Მონანიება
Directed by Tengiz Abuladze
Written by Tengiz Abuladze, Nana Janelidze, Rezo Kveselava
Cinematography by Mikhail Agranovich
Music by Nana Dzanelidze
Starring: Avtandil Makharadze, Zeinab Botsvadze, Ia Ninidze
In Georgian with English subtitles
Winner of the FIPRESCI and Jury Prizes at the Cannes Film Festival, 1987
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Commissar
Directed by Aleksandr Askoldov • 1967 • USSR/Russia
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