Life in the Armenian mountains is evoked by astonishing images of the hardness of the work (transhumance, hay harvest) and the emotion that reigns during the festivals. Non-narrative cinematographic poem, without commentary, to music by Vivaldi, sometimes interrupted by synchronous sounds.

A man struggles in the torrent, catches up with a sheep, perhaps drowns, is swept away again. A group of men, with a sheep in their arms, rush down steep, stony or snow-covered slopes at full speed. They pull, push, hold or are carried away by the haystacks sliding down the hills. A mired truck that we try to free at night in torrential rain. The man who was carried away by the torrent is now married, he wears his most beautiful clothes, his wife laughs, cries, supported by her friends who kiss him in turn. Both simple and mystical dimension of the scenes of everyday life rendered by an editing of rare strength.

Nathalie Magnan

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