Salome Jashi's new documentary to screen at Sundance festival

Jashi's latest documentary will screen as part of the international competition section at Sundance. Photo via Sundance Film Festival.

Agenda.ge, 16 Dec 2020 - 16:02, Tbilisi,Georgia

Filmmaker Salome Jashi will see her latest documentary Taming the Garden screened at the upcoming Sundance Film Festival, with the event set for an online run starting next month.

The feature-length work will have the premiere screening at the renowned festival on January 31, and a second showing on February 2, bringing Jashi's look at the controversial process of uprooting and moving unique plants from Georgia's Black Sea coastline by the country's former prime minister.

A preview from Sundance has praised the work for "astonishing cinematic style" and its director - recipient of awards from Jean Rouch and Nyon film festivals, among others - for "shrewdly observant eye".

 

[...] Taming the Garden tracks the surreal uprooting of ancient trees from their Georgian locales. With each removal, tensions flare between workers and villagers.

Some see financial incentives - new roads, handsome fees - while others angrily mourn the loss of what was assumed an immovable monolith of their town’s collective history and memory" - Sundance Film Festival

A co-production between Switzerland, Germany and Georgia, the 86-minute work involves photography by Jashi and Goga Devdariani and is produced by the director alongside Vadim Jendreyko, Erik Winker and Martin Roelly.

The documentary will screen in the World Cinema Documentary Competition section of the United States-based festival, with the event set for an online run due to the pandemic. Nine other releases will be shown in the section.

Jashi has won acclaim for her documentary work for The Dazzling Light of Sunset - which collected prizes at the Nyon and ZagrebDox festivals, among other events - and Bakhmaro. She was also picked to present two films, including the latter documentary, at Berlin's Arsenal Institute for Film and Video Art for a programme of the venue this year.