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The relative autonomy of historical times embodied in the form of film: on one side, the already classic genre of East European allegorical retrospection drawing metaphysical authority from 19th-century symbols, in which nations were born: yet others, not the once occupied small but proud nationalisms – naturally, the then-still non-autonomous Soviet republics in the 1960s to 1980s had to fight their cultural battle with a one-century delay, thanks to which these films enjoy a unique sense of poetics, with which they can separate any historical or visual motif and make it a privileged nodal point Allegory: here, for example, the mesmerizing shot of an open holy book of the nation leafed through by wind illuminated by divine light of the Georgian homeland… It's potent, Rekhviashvili is ingenious, but it would be slightly stale if the director had not remembered that he is already a hundred years ahead: in the era after all the new waves and after Kafka, Rekhviashvili ingeniously creates tension between the 19th century and the 20th century using all subtle but significantly jumpy cuts, cross-cutting or discreet estrangements (narrative within narrative). It is precisely this internal tension that drives the main character to a self-denying absurd final gesture, as well as the film towards its inherently programmed self-destruction. (2024.06.22)