Uzbek Film to Premiere at Seattle International Film Festival

We are very excited that a film from Uzbekistan, 40 Days of Silence (Chilla), has been selected to be shown at the Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF) this year!

40DaysOfSilence_440x300Please mark your calendars for the two showings and please attend! The schedule is as follows:

Tuesday, May 20th, at the Harvard Exit Theater, at 7:00 pm

Thursday, May 22nd, at the Harvard Exit Theater, at 4:30 pm

The ticket price is $12. You may purchase tickets now at the SIFF website.

This is the North American premier of the film, which is directed by Saodat Ismailova. The cast includes Rukhshona Sattarova, Barohat Shukurova, Saodat Rahimova, and Farida Olimova.

The director, Saodat Ismailova, studied film-making at the Tashkent State Art Institute and then joined the cinema department of Fabrica in Italy, where she directed her first film, Aral, Fishing In An Invisible Sea (2004). Saodat also has her own company, Map Production, in Tashkent.

More complete information about the film is available on the SIFF website, but, in summary, in an isolated Uzbek village, young Bibicha takes a traditional vow of silence and moves into her grandmother’s old house, along with three other women, to be part of a chilla, or spiritual “quarantine.”

We hope that you will be able to attend this film! It has been many years since an Uzbek film has been shown. The competition for films is extensive, so it is a great honor that this Uzbek film has been selected.

In addition, a Russian film, called Shame, directed and written by Yusup Razykov, an Uzbek filmmaker born in Uzbekistan in 1957, will be shown. He has directed other Uzbek films, as well (The Dance of Men in 2002 and Migrant Worker in 2009). Yusup will be here in Seattle and attending the showings for both shows!

A brief synopsis of Shame: “The desolation and chilling beauty of northwest Russia is masterfully played against the longings of a community of women who await their husbands’ return from submarine missions at sea.“

Shame is showing on Sunday, June 1, at 5:00 pm at the SIFF Cinema Uptown Theater, and again on Monday, June 2, at 3:30 pm at the same theater. The cost is the same as other films ($12).

When you purchase tickets for either film, you can get a $2 discount if you use the promo code of EURUS2014. The SIFF website for the film is here: http://www.siff.net/festival-2014/shame

We hope you will join us for one or both of these films!