Chantrapas (2010)
Director: Otar Iosseliani
Country: France | Georgia
Runtime: 122 min
Nicolas is an artist, a filmmaker who merely
wants to express himself and whom everyone wishes to reduce to silence.
When he first starts out in Georgia,
the
"ideologists" hope to gag him, concerned that his work does not follow
the set rules. In the face of their determination, Nicolas leaves his
homeland for France - the land of freedom and democracy. But the "state
of grace" will not last long.
Dan Fainaru
Welcome to
the private, whimsical world of Otar Iosseliani. Access permitted only
for those who share his constant thirst for any liquid containing
alcohol, the stronger the better, for his ironic outlook of the world
around him and his immense sympathy for the human race, despite its
countless shortcomings.
The film is cut by Iosseliani in his typical easy-going manner, suggesting that telling the story in a cogent manner.
Unbelievers would better stay away, for they will never quite grasp the
spirit of this satirical sketch, autobiographical to be sure, though,
as Iosseliani himself points out, reflecting not only his own past (he
claims to have been luckier than the film’s hero), but that of many
others, from Alexander Askoldov to Andrei Tarkovski.
Probably
one of the more personal pages in Iosseliani’s family album, this is
bound as usual to be welcome only in festivals and art houses, but
luckily, there are plenty of those around.
The two sections of
the plot are quite similar, though the first part takes place in
Iosseliani’s native Georgia, the second in France, the country he has
lived in since the early 1980s. It starts with the illicit projection of
a film sequence (in reality a Iosseliani short of 1959 never shown
before) and it goes on to follow Niko (Tarielashvili), an aspiring
filmmaker, facing ideologues who are only too happy to explain
officially their objections to his work, and to congratulate him
secretly for his talents.
There is a brief flashback to
Nicholas’ childhood and plenty of insights into the particular nature of
his family and his neighbors, not to mention a glimpse or two into his
filmmaking and his clashes with the filmmaking system.
Once it
is clear there is no future for him at home, he tries his luck in Paris,
sweeps the streets, cleans the zoo, feeds the elephants and the bears
and finely meets a producer who offers him the chance to direct a film
in France, at which point he discovers that the free-spirited West puts
no fewer obstacles on his way than the indoctrinated censors of home.
The plot, however, has never held much of an interest for Iosseliani,
it is the details on the road that have always delighted his admirers in
the past, and will probably charm them all over again. A poet at heart
whose visual imagination is always at work - watch one shot young Niko
sets up which starts with an orchestra playing on a balcony and ends
with an officer being blown-up by a bomb behind a tree - as he delivers
his running commentary on the world we live in, embracing one and all in
a warm, gentle hug and rejecting any such sentiments as spite or
revenge, which would make life so much more miserable to live.
Around brief guest performances by Iosseliani himself (he claims the
actor for whom the role was intended died just before the shooting),
Bulle Ogier and celebrated actor/director Pierre Etaix in a great
send-up of a French producer, the cast consists, as usual, of
non-professionals who fit perfectly in the mood, with lead Tarielashvili
quite reminiscent of the young Iosseliani.
Homogenously shot
by two different cinematographers, one in Georgia the other in France,
the film is cut by Iosseliani in his typical easy-going manner,
suggesting that telling the story in a cogent manner has never been an
essential quality in his eyes.
Director: Alice Rohrwacher
