Life in the Armenian mountains is evoked by striking images of the harshness of the work (transhumance, harvesting of hay) and the emotion reigning in the festivals. A non-narrative cinematographic poem, without comments, to music by Vivaldi, sometimes interrupted by synchronous sounds.

A man struggles in the torrent, catches a sheep, drowns perhaps, is swept away again. A group of men, a sheep in their arms, run down steep and rocky or snowy slopes at a furious pace. They pull, push, hold back or are carried away by the haystacks sliding down the hills. A truck, stuck in the mud, which people try to free at night under torrential rain. The man being swept away by the torrent is now getting married, he’s wearing his best clothes, his wife laughs, cries, backed up by her girlfriends who hug her in turn. A dimension, which is both simple and mystic, of scenes from everyday life, rendered by a film editing of a rare force.

Artavazd Pelechian was born in 1938 in Armenia. He worked from 1959 to 1963 in a tool manufacturing workshop, as a worker, then as an industrial designer and finally as a technical constructor. From 1963 to 1968, he studied directing at the Moscow Film Institute, VGIK. Author of thirteen films, short or medium-length films made mainly for Yerevan television, Pelechian is known for the poetic nature of his productions, where he mixes documentary cinema, archives, music and sound effects aestheticizing the elements of daily life. A master in the art of editing, his work holds an important place in the history of cinema and his films still remain uncommonly creative today.

Source : Tënk