Film: Watch Armenian director Sergei Parajanov’s masterpiece The Colour of Pomegranates online for free

Calvert Journal
Jan 8 2021
Watch Armenian director Sergei Parajanov’s masterpiece The Colour of Pomegranates online for free
8 January 2021
Text: Paula Erizanu
Celebrate the 97th birthday of Armenian filmmaker Sergei Parajanov by watching his masterpiece, The Colour of Pomegranates.
 
Viewers in the UK can watch the film for free with English subtitles on Eastern European cinema platform Kino Klassika until 12 January.
 
The poetic film tells the life story of 18th-century Armenian poet Sayat Nova, with visuals rich with poetic symbolism and vivid colour contrasts. The film is also a love letter to traditional Armenian culture, celebrating the country’s music, crafts, churches, and rural life.
 
Born in Georgia on 9 January 1924, Parajanov worked in Ukraine and Armenia before moving into film in 1954. All of his films made between 1965 to 1973 were banned in the Soviet Union, and the director was ultimately imprisoned for four years on charges of rape, homosexuality, and bribery. He was only able to make more films and have them screened in the mid-80s, due to the increased freedom under glasnost. The director died of lung cancer in 1990, just as his films were beginning to circulate and gain recognition at international festivals.

Emil Lazarian

“I should like to see any power of the world destroy this race, this small tribe of unimportant people, whose wars have all been fought and lost, whose structures have crumbled, literature is unread, music is unheard, and prayers are no more answered. Go ahead, destroy Armenia . See if you can do it. Send them into the desert without bread or water. Burn their homes and churches. Then see if they will not laugh, sing and pray again. For when two of them meet anywhere in the world, see if they will not create a New Armenia.” - WS