Throughout the year, “Golden Apricot” film festival was engaged in the implementation of a special program approved by the Genocide events State Committee – screening of the Armenian genocide movies worldwide in various cities and towns. To the point, the program included not only film shot by Armenian and of Armenia, but also by foreign national film directors.
In the interview with “Aravot”, Founding Director of the “Golden Apricot” film festival, also a well-known film director Harutyun Khachatryan said that 20 films were screened in Berlin in 1.5 months. The film screenings both in Belarus and in Berlin were accompanied by Q&A and discussion, the Belarus General Radio Station has made a big program on genocide, and Levon Sargsyan has delivered two lectures in these countries.
Under the program, performance were showed in Berlin, as well as concerts in participation of Armenian singers, including Arto Tunchboyachyan’s and Armenian Navy Band’s concert, while Maxim Gorki Theater in Berlin staged “The 40 Days of Musa Dagh”. The events, among others, were attended by Atom Egoyan, Arsine Khanjian, Nicole Pezchyan, and Carla Karapetyan. Harutyun Khachatryan says that they speak of the Armenian Genocide through arts. According to the film director, in all the countries, most of the financing was covered by the partner organizations, for example, in Berlin, they cooperated with a Foundation and the Maxim Gorky Theatre. Interestingly, the latter’s director Shermin Langhoff was a Turk by origin.
According to our interlocutor, the director of the theater had invited Turks from Turkey who conduct pro-Armenian activities. “Golden Apricot” had also implemented film screenings on the subject of genocide in Bulgaria, in the Sofia Festival, then in Varna, and in Plovdiv in support of Armenian companies and the church. The screenings in Paris went on interestingly, more than 20 films were screened, attended by film critic David Muradyan, the “Golden Apricot” festival artistic director Susanna Harutyunyan, and film director Ara Yernjakyan. On May 27, another evening party will be held in Paris dedicated to the commemoration of the Armenian Genocide, which will be attended by statesmen representing various spheres, writers, and diplomats. An impressive program was carried out in Lithuania and Turkey. Generally, the “Golden Apricot” has conducted subtitles of the films on genocide in respective languages, has made copies of the film and has sent to the embassies from Japan to Mexico to organize evening parties.
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In the near future, a program is planned for the festival in Moscow, the one held in Switzerland was not less than exciting. “Never Again” project coordinator, also a film critic, Raffi Movsisyan, told “Aravot” that the program started in Belarus for this country was the first to respond, and the local partner organization was the “Wheel” Armenian Studies Research Center, and naturally the Armenian Embassy to Belarus. In February this year, the start launched from the Faculty of History of the Belarus State University, then for three days in a course, about 10 film with double sittings were screened.
As said by Raffi Movsisyan, jointly with the RA Ministry of Culture, the list of the films addressing the genocide was compiled, then the Arts Council has chosen the films valuable by their artistic value and historical reliability. “When showing the films, we also consider the participation of given country, if a famous actor of a country was shot in the film, or let’s say, the Ministry of Culture of given country has somehow support, we try to localize all of that. The program was pretty good. For the start, we wanted to understand that the program is not organized only for Diaspora Armenians and purely Armenians, we target was a broader audience. To the point, thanks to the wonderful work by our Embassy to Belarus and the “Wheel”, seven ambassadors attended the opening ceremony of the program, in addition to representatives of other embassies.
What comes to Germany, the biggest film program was implemented there. Starting from Fatih Akin’s “The Scar” movie, other films were also screened – Atom Egoyan’s “Ararat”, Garin Hovannisian’s ‘The 1915’ and many other films. The program contained something commemorating in it, and foreigners were more present in our audience. This was not the case to showing purely the Armenian film and the culture, our message was much more political – the Armenian Genocide,” said Raffi Movsisyan. As his words, one of the key achievements of the “Golden Apricot” are its connections, the “Golden Apricot”, based on its connections, has the chance to show films containing political subtext under the world’s greatest film festivals, and it is important that there are countries that do not officially recognize the Armenian Genocide, however, the major film festivals in these countries are cooperating with us.
“Golden Apricot” film festival’s artistic director Susanna Harutyunyan presenting the program of Lithuania, said that it was in the framework of “Kino Pavasaris” International Festival, four films was presented in the special program by the suggestion of Armenia: Nerses Hovhannisyan’s “Meeting at the Exhibition,” Ara Yernjakyan’s “Eclipse,” Eric Nazarian’s “Bolis,” and Serge Avedikian’s “Barking Island”. The opening ceremony in Lithuania was attended by our Ambassador Ara Ayvazyan, Deputy of Lithuanian Seimas Algis Kašėta. Local Armenian film director Marat Sargsyan and the Festival Director Vida Ramoškienė greatly supported. “We presented the film before the screening, and the Ambassador and the Director provided the political message and the media covered all of it very well. Naturally, the films were shown with subtitles in Lithuanian,” added Ms. Harutyunyan.
Speaking of the Paris program, Susanna Harutyunyan noted that it was opened on March 6 with Parajanov’s “The Color of Pomegranates,” and the partner was “Europa Film Act” festival. The latter’s administration took on the special program of genocide readily. Bagrat Hovhannisyan’s, Henrik Malyan’s, Harutyun Khachatryan’s, Suzanne Khardalian’s film were screened. The films, as always, were followed by discussions and Q&A. “Golden Apricot” had two important events in the framework of the International Festival in Istanbul. The emphasis was on the film that were shot by the Turks, particularly in regard to Haji Orman’s scandalous “Homo Politicus.” The film is created under the Armenian-Turkish Platform of the “Golden Apricot”. It represents the dialogue between Enver Pasha and Lepsius, and the other one is the film by Anna Benjamin and Guillaume Anne-Claire about the heroes revealing their Armenian roots. To the point, they were included in the separate section of “Pain of 100 years” of the festival.
Gohar HAKOBYAN
