Tengiz Abuladze - Natvris Khe aka The Wishing Tree (1976)

Reading various reviews by buffs, moviegoers or cinema critics, we have noticed one prevailing and disturbing trend—the fact that directors like Tarkovsky, Visconti and Tengiz Abuladze are most often underrated and have a very bad reputation. This touches one of the profoundest things in aesthetics. In empirical terms, it is about the directors that use a slow pace; authors, that is, of mainly slow—paced films. The slow pace (as in Tarkovski, Sokurov and Tengiz Abuladze) is the one that details. That deepens. But, on the other hand,is this slow—pace approach (only) an option? It certainly depends—as there are various factors involved—the content, the subject, the style and tone, the aims, the atmosphere, the requirements of a certain story, the optics, etc.—above all, the adequacy .Yet the real subtext is very valid always—the whole may be found within the piece, but it takes some time, an artistically determined time,a certain measure (and hence pace) to know even the piece. The cognition isn't instantaneous. A certain period is needed to get, to understand a thing. Tarkovsky, Sokurov, Visconti, Antonioni, Tengiz Abuladze never use more than it is really needed; nor do they shorten, arbitrarily, the period. A very good example of such adequacy is one of Kurosawa's last films—the dream film. To know the things that Tarkovsky, Antonioni, Sokurov ,Kurosawa, Antonioni set themselves up to understand and seize—to reach this gist—it is not enough for the mind to jump aimlessly—as in the MTV—style of montage or cutting. It is wholly inappropriate to ask them (often contemptuously) to give up their montage, when it is the only one ever that can best serve their subjects and the contents of their movies. On the other hand yet, this is artistic knowledge, one of the highest forms of human fulfillment—so one cannot establish a priori an algebra of montage rules—the time will be used according to the ad hoc needs of the subject and of the content.


In the '40s,'50s,'60s,in several waves, film critics and movie buffs approached the question of the movie's language, semantics, syntax. Several theories were proposed. On the other hand, the bleak assessments didn't lack—many talked about how few the really important authors are, etc.
What is the cinema's aim?Of expressing through an original and suited language, art, style and adequacy an artistic creativity. It is an equation; thereof several terms must be considered when dealing with its aesthetic analysis. Where from does it take its richness? From a careful balance of elements!

The Early films (made in co-operation with T. Chkheidze) were definitely influenced by the Italian NeoRealism (though the influence was more stylistical than conceptual). In the first film - Magdanas Lurja- the classic short story of I. Chavchavadze (Writer, Poet and Political Activist of the 19th century, assassinated by the socialists, and later declared a Saint by the Georgian Orthodox Church) was used to make one of the earliest attempts of Georgian cinema alla' Neorealism. The attempt was nice for the debut but was limited by the demands of Official Censorship - the story of a 19th century court case obviously had a Propaganda touch - "Such injustice would never happen in the Soviet Union". Even the happy end of the original story was changed.
In the next film - Our Yard - in addition to obvious use of Neorealistic traditions one can feel (mostly in camerawork) the influence a new cinematic vogue - Indian Cinema (that used to be very appraised at some period in USSR before becoming a stereotype of mixture of melodrama, singing and fighting-by the way very popular among certain parts of the Soviet audience). Despite (or maybe because of) all these Our Yard was very popular with Georgian viewers .
Others Children - finishes the "NeoRealistic Period" and mixes the extremely melodramatic story with stylish (sometimes excessively stylish) visuals. This film reflects the new fashion of using camera and editing in cinema established in USSR by the director D.Kalatozishvili (sometimes referred as Kalatozov).

The major achievement of Tengiz Abuladze himself is a trilogy The Plead (Vedreba), Tree of Wishes (Natvris Khe) and Repentance (Monanieba). Whereas I personally regard all three films to be masterpieces, the Non-Georgian Audience will hardly understand their depth as most symbols and allusions used are "Very Georgian". Despite this the last two parts of a trilogy got a wide critical acclaim and Repentance even became the major commercial hit at Soviet Cinemas. But with the magnificent Plead the situation was different. The major problem is that film is not just based on the poetry of Vaja-Pshavela (regarded by many to be the greatest Georgian poet ever), its literally full of it. Poetry of Vaja-Pshavela is very complex one and actually not translatable as he uses a very specific language, symbols, notions and terms of East Georgia Mountain Provinces, the mood of the entire film is based on this verses constantly cited within the film; Retelling just their content gives nothing and foreign audience is left with graphic and extravagant visuals that may seem interesting for 10 minutes but become tiresome during the full-length film. Both visually and conceptually the film is perhaps the most outstanding and controversial Georgian film of its time.
Unlike the Plead, the Tree of Wishes was accepted by Georgian audience without any hesitation. Tree of Wishes is exquisite for its beautiful cinematography and all star casting (from these especially should be noted Lika Kavjaradze as beautiful Marita, Sophico Chiaureli as extravagant Pupala , Ramaz Chikvadze as a corrupt priest, Erosi Manjgaladze as idealistic patriot and Cecilia Takaishvili who once again (since "I, Grandma, Ilia and Illarion") gave a brilliant performance (again as a grandmother and again giving the brilliant ending of the film). The various characters and storylines of Giorgi Leonidze's short stories about his childhood are united in a delicious, poetic and entertaining film.



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