December 2, 2014, 4:00 p.m. — Blue Mountains aka An Unbelievable Story (1984)
Blue Mountains aka An Unbelievable Story
1984. USSR. Directed and cowritten by Eldar Shengelaia. With Ramaz Giorgobiani, Vasil Kakhnishvili, Teimuraz Chirgadze, Ivan Sakvarelidze. An inspired satire by one of Georgia’s leading directors, Blue Mountains is a disarming and cleverly precise critique of bureaucracy as stifling stasis, set in a publishing house in Tbilisi, where a writer and his manuscript submission are all but ignored as the employees, a colorful cast of characters, carry on with their private affairs and outside interests, oblivious to his needs. This deftly orchestrated study of an office environment is part Jacques Tati, part Ermanno Olmi, capturing nuanced situations with an eye for humor and timing. Blue Mountains was included in Directors’ Fortnight at the 1985 Cannes Film Festival, but the director was prohibited from attending by Soviet authorities; Shengelaia was present to introduce the film in the 2014 festival’s classics category. In Georgian; English subtitles. 97 min.
