#918: PARAJANOV, Sergei: The Color Of Pomegranates (1969)
PARAJANOV, Sergei (Soviet Union)
The Color Of Pomegranates [1969]
Spine #918
Blu-ray
The Booklet
Twelve-page wraparound featuring a very informative essay by Ian Christie.
Commentary
Tony Rayns. Indispensible.
Documentary 1
The Color of Armenian Land, a rarely seen 1969 documentary by Mikhail Vartanov featuring footage of director Sergei Parajanov at work.
Video essay
on the film's symbols and references, featuring scholar James Steffen.
Video interview
with Steffen on the production of the film.
Documentaries 2 & 3
The Color Of Pomegranates [1969]
Spine #918
Blu-ray
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.
78 minutes
Color
Monaural
in Armenian, Azerbaijani, and Georgian
1:371 aspect ratio
Monaural
in Armenian, Azerbaijani, and Georgian
1:371 aspect ratio
Criterion Release 2018
Director/Writer
It would be hard to imagine a filmmaker who went through the hell that Parajanov went through to make his films.
Beginning in the mid-60s, he literally invented his own style of filmmaking, which so obviously conflicted with the required Soviet realism-style of the time. That, and his own sexual preferences, doomed his films from seeing the light of day during that period. He spent years in prison.
The Film
Unless you are unusually familiar with Armenian culture, or the work of the 18th-century poet, Sayat-Nova, watching this film for the first time will most certainly be a bewildering experience.
With no specific narrative, Parajanov presents scenes of what the French call tableaux vivant -- living pictures. The film purports to present the life of the poet -- but Parajanov does so with audacious subtlety. The posed people move, expressing the inner life of the poet.
The actress Sofiko Chiaureli plays at least five distinct roles, both male and female.
It is all very beautiful -- but incomprehensible without some frame of reference. Thank goodness for Tony Rayns.
Criterion's restoration is miraculous.
In 2020, Lady Gaga released a video of her song 911, which uses images from the film, re-staged.
Film Rating (0-60):
51
The ExtrasThe Booklet
Twelve-page wraparound featuring a very informative essay by Ian Christie.
Commentary
Tony Rayns. Indispensible.
Documentary 1
The Color of Armenian Land, a rarely seen 1969 documentary by Mikhail Vartanov featuring footage of director Sergei Parajanov at work.
Video essay
on the film's symbols and references, featuring scholar James Steffen.
Video interview
with Steffen on the production of the film.
Documentaries 2 & 3
From 1977 and 2003 on Armenian poet Sayat-Nova and Parajanov.
Documentary short
The Last Film, a 2015 experimental short documentary by Martiros M. Vartanov.
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