Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, a major cinema event of Central and Eastern Europe, is underway in the Czech Republic, with three works by Georgian directors in three different screening sections.
With the festival opening its doors on Friday - and hosting over 6,000 visitors and participants by Monday - the programme has seen lively competition and nearly 160 screenings so far. And among the films seen by audiences are features by Soso Bliadze, Alexandre Koberidze, Levan Koguashvili.
In East of the West Competition segment, Otar's Death by Bliadze - released this year in co-production involving Georgia, Germany and Lithuania - has had two screenings at the Karlovy Vary Municipal Theatre and Cas Cinema venues.
Unfolding in a "meditation on human morals while not shying away from a tragicomic tone", the feature is a look at two families facing different outcomes from an unfortunate event. The film comes from the filmmaker who was awarded Best International Short Film prize at the exground filmfest and Special Mention of the German Competition at the Berlin International Short Film Festival for his work Three Steps.
A still from 'Otar's Death', a feature by Soso Bliadze. Photo via Karlovy Vary International Film Festival
Alexandre Koberidze, another young director from Georgia, is highlighted in the Horizons section with his Berlin International Film Festival-screened What Do We See When We Look at the Sky?, the feature that earned the FIPRESCI prize at the event earlier this year.
The German-Georgian co-production brings the filmmaker's look at romantic partners waking up one day with changed appearances and losing contact with one another as a result. It has been called a "slyly inventive, free-ranging adventure in cinematic possibility" by ScreenDaily on its premiere.
In the Special Screenings part of the Czech festival, Koguashvili features with his Brighton 4th - a winner of three awards at this year's Tribeca Film Festival. The director has built his script in the work around a Georgian wrestler embarking on a mission to rescue his son from debt incurred in gambling in Brooklyn, with the feature called "electrifying" by the American festival.
All three films are on the Karlovy Vary screenings schedule for the remainder of the event, which is set to close on Saturday.