ԱՅՍՊԵՍ ԱՍԱՑ ՔԱՄԻՆ

Anahit's dyed, dark-red hair, identify her, on the basis of her appearance alone, as a stranger in the place she once called home. The locals are sceptical of anything new, and the returnee is met with suspicion and dislike.

"Can you tell me about the war?" Anahit asks her lover, but he refuses to share his pain. Scenes like this subtly hint at the conflicts characteristic of contemporary Armenian society. While the characters struggle for words to express wounds clearly felt beneath the surface, director Maria Rigel seeks images to convey them.

She left her Russian homeland in 2022 and has lived and worked in Armenia ever since. In Thus Spoke the Wind, she speaks of outsiders unable to offer one another support. The film is captured in a way that translates their speechlessness into a striking, symbolic imagery, one that conveys the distance between the characters while simultaneously lending them individual depth. In the atmospheric sound design, the eponymous wind is just as present as the sound of the duduk, a type of oboe considered a symbol of Armenian national identity.

Text: Susanne Mohr

Wed 05.11. I 15:30 I WELTSPIEGEL GROSSER SAAL I original version with English and German subtitles

Thu 06.11. I 18:30 I WELTSPIEGEL SAAL 3 I original version with English and German subtitles