Lana Gogoberidze’s films often depict strong women who challenge fate and dare to defy predestination. Such is the case with “Some Interviews on Personal Matters”, her star work, at the same time funny and sad, made in 1978.

Sofiko works in the letters department of a newspaper. Her job, which she loves, is to listen to people and help solve their problems. But when her husband starts accusing her of dedicating herself to work instead of home, she is devastated.

The film deals with the lives of modern Georgian women without simplifying and stigmatising – it is more of a confession, a dialogue with oneself and the surrounding reality. Maia Turovskaya, one of the best experts on Russian film history and totalitarianism, called it the first true “women’s film” in the Soviet Union with good reason.

The film, which moves in a fascinating way between the present and the past, narrowly escaped being cut at the time because it also includes the story of Sofiko’s mother being sent to Gulag and returning from there, and the painful mark it left on Sofiko. Lana Gogoberidze has inserted her own past here, her mother also spent time in Siberia as the wife of an enemy of the people. “Maybe I started making films about women because of my mother,” is something the filmmaker herself suggested.

The film stars one of Georgia’s greatest actors, Sofiko Chiaureli, and features one of composer Giya Kancheli’s finest soundtracks.

Attention!!! The 96-year-old dazzling and energetic Lana Gogoberidze will be in Tallinn for the screening.

Tiit Tuumalu