Diyette Olanlara Kahvaltı
photo by Leyla GulalIyeva
120 worldofazerbaijan
121 worldofazerbaijan
PORTRAIT
… Before I went to interview him the film director Yaver Rzayev had invited me to the premiere of the biblically-called “God’s Creature”, the joint creature of the Bizim Kino Production Centre and the Yaddash (“Memory”) Studio... But we’ll talk about that a trifle later. Let’s start with the auteur. ‘I took the schooling in film direction twice,’ Yaver says. ‘I was studying from the elements up at the Arts Institute; Agakishi Kyazimov was my mentor there. I was also temping trying to get a job related to movies in this way or other. What I found was the job of the assistant of Ghita Bessantina, the director of the Veten Cinema. The Veten was living through its heyday and was considered one of the centres of the cultural life in the city at that time. By the way, I shot my first experimental movie right there. The 20-minute thing was romantic – a love story under the influence of Agutagawa. ‘Then – the VGIK...’ ‘I studied as a docu editor in the workshop of Lisakovich. Shot the “Shame” at the asylum for the old people; it was shown at the “Appeal to the Man” International Festival in St Petersburg – hors concours. Another psychological docu, called “The Last Step”, was shot in Baku and was about the problem of the suicide. ‘By the way, I consider the psychotherapist Agabek Sultanov my second teacher. The famous scientist helped as a consultant. The picture “The Other World, or the Intended Mistake” was my diploma work and it went on to win Grand Prize at the festival in Ashkhabad. All of that went parallel to my studies. I tried to sit all the exams and do all the necessaries so I can shoot more.’ ‘And the trouble time – the events in January...’ ‘The movie “Haray” was my response to the bloody tragedy. Nobody shot in that manner at that time. Somebody in Moscow was surprised; they said, “You have such things going on, couldn’t you really shoot something?” It set my back up. I took the reel to my teacher. He said, “Sit down and shut up. What you did is stronger than that.”’ ‘The Sari ’Ghelin? A turning-point? ‘I used the famous song as an archetype there. It is a song about division, sadness and death – all those things that swept over Karabakh together. Why did it become popular abroad? Well, because that was the first time when the world knew the truth about our grief. The picture was awarded at the Kinoshok CIS/Baltic Festival in Anapa in 1999.’
122 worldofazerbaijan
МАСТЕР ИЗЛОЖЕНИЯ ПРАВДЫ НА ЯЗЫКЕ КИНО