10/11/2024
Irine Jordanania's debut opens the 28th PÖFF | Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival's Black Carpet. The movie was screened under Gorgian Spotlight," Under the magnifying glass: Independent Voices of Georgian Voices."
The film is built around the two characters, Eka(Tika Lagidze) and Nico( Lado Oniani). Eka is a TV presenter who lives in her separate world. Her only human dialogue is the one-sided voice message from a relative who recounts her passing memories. Niko shares his solo space with a cat and plant to accompany him while he is working on his AI project. Both are engrossed in their world. They encounter a visual art space but depart without words or acknowledgement. The humdrum of daily life breaks with unexpected tragedy and chance revelation.
Irine's bold cinematic venture challenges traditional spectatorship. In a seemingly loose narrative, there is a rich collage of scenes of daily life events, where ordinary people and characters passing the time are sawn together, making a collective human tapestry. Together with Irine, the cinematographer, Giorgi Shvelidze, creates minimalistic frames layered with colour and texture, capturing the voice of passing the time. Through long takes and meticulous framing, Giogi demands conscious executorship.
At the Q and A with the filmmaker and cast about filmmaking, the lead female protagonist, Tika, shared her experiences about the organic filmmaking process, where their everyday lives and experiences were brought into the film as reality rather than fiction. Irine further expanded that she attempts to get an authentic universal human story, their resilience in all adversaries and struggles.
Air Blue Silk is an independent film. Irine and her cast and crew are brave filmmakers who uphold the independence of Georgian cinema and raise their voices against the authorities' suppression of freedom of speech and expression.
