Day Is Longer Than Night

Structured like a ballad, this film features breathtaking nature shots filmed on location in the Georgian mountains, lavish folklore, folk poetry, and ironic undertones. The landscape is as monumental as the history that forms the backdrop for the woman’s fate it narrates. Towering mountains, expansive ridgelines, tiny villages—this is where Eva, the daughter of a farmer, falls deeply in love with the shepherd Georgiy.

But Eva’s love is imperiled, as her life becomes dominated by the turmoil of revolution, civil war, the New Economic Policy, and collectivization. The episodes of the film are narrated by traveling performers on a donkey cart (!) with folk songs, highlighted by the incredible singer-songwriter Manana Menabde. Throughout, Gogoberidze’s fascination with expressive faces shines, particularly that of Darejan Kharshiladze as Eva.

*Day Is Longer Than Night* competed at Cannes in 1984. (Gaby Babić/Barbara Wurm)

Photo: Arsenal Berlin