1970-1980-იანი წლების ქართული დოკუმენტური კინო

From September 14 to October 26, DOCA Film Club presents a new program.

Curator's Note

Studying Georgian documentary cinema is one of the most fascinating and moving processes. It involves exploring its history, memory, forms, language, stories, and thematic range, and, in parallel, understanding the challenges, pain, struggles, official narratives, and authorial searches of that time.

What's fascinating is discovering films made across different decades, bringing them back to life, and returning them, both to the screen and to spaces of discussion, research, and everyday life. This process resembles archaeology: a search through images, people's voices, biographies, cultural and critical contexts, and the history of the country itself.

The history of Georgian cinema as a whole is also suspended between myth and reality with its own treasury, told stories, fiction and truth alike. The discovery and study of the history of Georgian documentary cinema, however, is only now beginning. This programme, too, resembles gathering fragments from a great, shared archive of memory, from the 1970s and 1980s. This is the period when documentary cinema stands even more firmly between myth and reality, though this tension is embedded in its very foundation. Where is reality here? Where is the official voice? Where is the author's gaze and perspective?

On the path of transformation from Soviet reality to an independent country, this programme will present: the visualization of labor; poetry and politics; authorial voices; imagery that sometimes says more than the voice-over; visual and acoustic experiments; women as fighters, workers, exhausted yet unbroken; the art of observing everyday life and the attempt to enter into dialogue with that reality, whether through creative language or precise documentation. Most importantly, you will encounter people's lives, the memory of places, and unique forms, from 1967 through 1990, stories that have much to tell us.

Georgian Documentary Cinema of the 1970s–1980s

films

14/09/2026 19:00 Amirani Cinema

Arabesques on the Pirosmani Theme - Director: Sergei Parajanov

21’ / 1985

School in the Mountains - Director: Teimuraz Dolidze

10’ / 1978

სიზმრებიდან ყოფამდე - ორი რადიკალურად განსხვავებული ფორმა, რომელიც გვიჩვენებს, რამდენად ფართო შეიძლება იყოს დოკუმენტური კინოს დიაპაზონი. ერთი მხრივ, ფარაჯანოვის სიზმრისეული, პოეტური და ჯადოსნური ენა, რომელიც ფიროსმანის სამყაროს მოხელთებას ცდილობს; მეორე მხრივ კი, ობსერვაციული ფილმი, რომელიც მთაში მცხოვრები ბავშვების ყოველდღიურობას აკვირდება.

21/09/2026 19:00 Amirani Cinema

Haymaking Month - Director: Merab Gagua

9’ / 1980

The Bakers - Director: Bidzina Rachvelishvili

10’ / 1970

Roads of the Riggers - Director: Nikolai Kuzanov

10’ / 1986

Wilderness - Director: Alexandre (Dato) Kokrashvili, Sandro Tushmalishvili

16’ / 1982

Silent Labor, the Poetry of Labor - The visualization of human labor was particularly important during this period. These films share with us the art of contemplation and the true magic of everyday routine.

28/09/2026 19:00 Amirani Cinema

Women Behind the Stone Wall - Director: Tengiz Malania

20’ / 1990

Tushetian Carpet - Director: Shergil Shonia

10’ / 1972

Whose Heart Aches - Director: Maia Kavtaradze

10’ / 1989

Portraits of Women — Between Everyday Life and Challenges

05/10/2026 19:00 Amirani Cinema

Kolkhida - Director: Soso Chkhaidze

20’ / 1967

A special screening and conversation around Soso Chkhaidze's Kolkhida. The film's unique visual language in its depiction of space and human labor, sits on the border between the real and the mythical. The film represents an important act of memory in twentieth-century Georgian documentary cinema, turning the thematic and visual impulses of several decades into a subject for engaging discussion.

12/10/2026 19:00 Amirani Cinema

Mtatsminda - Director: Vazha Zubashvili

16’ / 1980

The Director - Director: Vazha Zubashvili

26’ / 1982

Somewhere There Was a War - Director: Vazha Zubashvili

20’ / 1989

Vazha Zubashvili Retrospective - The memory of the 1980s, captured in the cinema of Vazha Zubashvili, across different themes, forms, and reflections on the time and its challenges. His camera offers an intriguing reflection on places, the myths attached to them, and, most importantly, on the human condition. Mtatsminda and its unconventional portrait, visual and acoustic, with linguistic explorations; a portrait of a female Soviet-era director and her daily life, conveyed with lightness and lively observation; and, finally, a look back at the trauma of people who fought in war.

19/10/2026 19:00 Amirani Cinema

The First-Footer - Director: Goderdzi Chokheli

15’ / 1981

Start - Director: Mikheil Chiaureli

10’ /1981

Love - Director: Leo Bakradze

25’ / 1985

Advertisement - Director: "Aromati" Coffee Grinder

3’ /1973

Visual-Acoustic Exploration - A varied set of films in which image, sound, and rhythm become essential elements of storytelling. Poetic observation, mountain space, human movement, and experimental form and editing. On the other hand, conversation and storytelling, and, finally, an advertisement from this period, which is itself an interesting visual artifact.