Uzhmuri (2018 digital transfer, world premiere outside Georgia)

Nutsa Gogoberidze: უჟმური / Uzhmuri (SU 1934).

უჟმური / Uzhmuri (The Wicked Deity of Mengrelian Swamps – Tropical Malaria) / Ujmuri, la regina della malaria.
    SU 1934. Director: Nutsa Gogoberidze. 56 min
    Scen.: Šalva Dadiani, Nutsa Gogoberidze. F.: Šalva Apakidze. Scgf.: Mikheil Gotsiridze. Recorded score composed by Giya Kancheli.
    Int.: Kote Daušvili (Parna), Merab Čikovani (Kavtar), Nutsa Čkeidze (Mariam), Ivlita Djordjadze (Tsiru), N. Iašvili (Gocha), O. Gogoberidze (Iagundisa), M. Tsitlidze (Kitsi), I. Slutsker (Gvada).
    Prod.: Goskinprom Gruzii. DCP. Bn.
    Bologna: Il Cinema Ritrovato: Early Women Directors in the Soviet Union
    DCP from 3003 Film Production. [Georgian version announced. But there were no intertitles, Georgian or otherwise on the DCP. Also the soundtrack was on-and-off. Perhaps we saw an unfinished workprint.]
    E-subtitles in Italian by SubTi Londra. English subtitles were missing, except for a short while.
    Introduce Salomé Alexi, the director's granddaughter, hosted by Bernard Eisenschitz.
    Viewed at Cinema Jolly, 30 Aug 2020.

Irène Bonnaud and Bernard Eisenschitz (Il Cinema Ritrovato 2020): "Rediscovered in 2018, and as yet never screened outside Georgia, Uzhmuri was banned after its release in 1934. Presumed lost, the chances were that it would not surface again. It was made during the turmoil of the transitional period between the dissolution of the Association of Proletarian Writers (1932) and the official proclamation of socialist realism (1934). The screenplay was reworked several times, and a discussion in October 1933 showed that Nutsa Gogoberidze was facing the by-then defamatory accusation of making an agitprop film. In truth, if the film does once again conform to the obligatory theme of ‘old and new’, its poetry and its strong dramatic construction shine out. Gogoberidze switches her focus from the Caucasus mountains to the marshes of Mingrelia, which the authorities want to drain to combat malaria. The opening images of bucolic nature are followed by a world of illness: “Even the trees have malaria”. And the young communists who take on this operation for sanitation find themselves in conflict with local superstitions. Many can’t imagine pitting themselves against Uzhmuri, the Queen of the Frogs who haunts the marshes. She is said to lead anybody who chances upon her territory down into the depths, where she forces them to marry her. Sadly, the film doesn’t show the Queen of the Frogs but instead a kulak; and after some breathtaking suspense, he is defeated. This happy ending did not, however, prevent the wrath of the censors. At the beginning of the film, a beautiful sequence shows a dying buffalo, drowning in the marsh that swallows him up. The children who had been responsible for looking after him are crying, and calling for help. The buffalo’s head, filmed very close, is slowly covered by the mud. Did this harrowing scene, and other brutally pessimistic ones, seal the film’s fate?" Irène Bonnaud and Bernard Eisenschitz (Il Cinema Ritrovato 2020)

AA: The battle between modernity and ancient customs and beliefs in the marshes of Mingrelia. In the beginning, a helpless buffalo cannot be saved from drowning, but in the finale, the Komsomolets Kavtar is rescued by his fiancée who offers him the barrel of his rifle (see photo above).

The milieu and the atmosphere are quite different from Buba, but there is a similar sense of grandeur in the footage of mighty clouds, flooding rivers and montages about building a new world. Romantic scenes are distracted by mosquitoes, and modernity is clouded by appearances of the village witch. The images of building a dam, establishing the first telephone lines, and engaging in collective work are engrossing. On the other hand, everything is sabotaged by arson, and superstition is rampant.

The cinematographer is Shalva Apaqidze, whom we know also for instance from Mikhail Kalatozov's Lursmani cheqmashi / [The Nail in the Boot]. Evidently we are here at the root of a magnificent tradition of cinematography, world famous in the Thaw era Kalatozov-Urusevsky collaborations such as The Cranes are Flying, The Letter That Was Not Sent and I Am Cuba.

In Uzhmuri, I also register an affinity with the groundbreaking cinematography of Eduard Tissé in Eisenstein's ¡Que viva México! The copy viewed of Uzhmuri, however, seemed highly duped with a loss of contrast.

What we saw was apparently a work-in-progress. A Georgian version was announced, but there were no intertitles, Georgian or otherwise. The soundtrack was on-and-off. E-subtitles in Italian by SubTi Londra ran smoothly during the whole presentation. English subtitles were missing, except for a short while. The sonorization was too obtrusive to my taste. Sound effects should be avoided in silent films as a rule. They distract from the grandeur of the visuals.