Here are the films shortlisted for Georgia’s 2018 Oscars bid
A commission of judges will reveal their favourite for the next Oscars. Photo: The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
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Six films will be vying to represent Georgia for the Best Foreign Language Film of the next Academy Awards after the Georgian National Film Centre announced the shortlist earlier this month.
For the 91st edition of the popular grand ceremony with millions of international viewers, the GNFC has selected works to be screened to a jury team late in August.
The shortlist includes the following features:
* Namme (directed by Zaza Khalvashi) — centred around a girl guardian of a healing spring in a mountainous Georgian village, entrusted with overseeing the healing waters by her father.
* Horizon (directed by Tinatin Kajrishvili) — featuring George Bochorishvili and Ia Sukhitashvili as principal protagonists struggling to restore their lives after separation.
* Khibula (directed by George Ovashvili) — a dramatised account of the final days of Georgia’s first president Zviad Gamsakhurdia, fleeing following a coup that ousted him from power in the early 1990s.
* Dede (directed by Mariam Khatchvani) — following a young woman in a story of romance and strict customs in Georgia’s remote mountainous Svaneti province.
* Ekvtime: Man of God (directed by Nikoloz Khomasuridze) — a biopic of Ekvtime Takaishvili, Georgian historian and archaeologist famous for his role in safeguarding Georgia’s cultural treasures following the 1921 invasion of the country by Soviet armies.
* Hamlet (directed by Giorgi Megrelishvili) — a political drama filmed through “minimalist” technique and based on Shakespeare’s timeless work.
The roster includes films that have been premiered and or awarded at festivals including the Berlin International Film Festival and the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.
The films will be screened to a GNFC commission before the judges reveal the winner to represent Georgia at the Oscars.
Filmmaker Zaza Khalvashi’s Namme will be Georgia’s bid for the next Academy Award for the Best Foreign Language Film, after a jury team in Tbilisi announced the feature as winner of a national contest.
Filmmaker Zaza Khalvashi’s new feature Namme — selected earlier this year as Georgia’s bid at the next Academy Awards — will be screened at an anniversary Palm Springs International Film Festival opening in California next week.