December 16, 2014, 4:30 p.m. — Invisible Spaces (2014), Brides (2014)

Brides

2014. Georgia. Directed by Tinatin Kajrishvili. With Mari Kitia, Giorgi Maskharashvili, Darejan Khachidze. Anchored by Kitia’s strong central performance as Nutza, a seamstress trying to keep life together for herself and her two children while her lover serves a 10-year prison sentence, the film is a restrained indictment of Georgia’s harsh penal system. Written by Kajrishvili and her husband David Chubinishvili, and based on their experiences when he was a prisoner, the film’s observational realism builds a strong atmosphere of dread and desperation, especially in scenes of large groups of women waiting in an enormous, forbidding facility to visit their jailed husbands. Following a surreal wedding ceremony in prison, the couple is allowed rare conjugal visits, the frustration of which is handled with great delicacy. This no-win situation, which is endured by over 30,000 prisoners and their families in Georgia, is given a rare personal dimension. In Georgian; English subtitles. 94 min.