Pam Renner’s Top Ten Georgian Movies

10. “Chemi Bebia” (My Grandmother) – 1929
Directed by Kote Mikaberidze
An eccentric Georgian silent film from the wild 1920s, a time of modernism in Tbilisi, repackaged by American composer Beth Custer, who has released it in DVD format with her own musical track.

9. “Dakarguli Samotkhe” (Paradise Lost) – 1937
Directed by David Rondeli
The irreverent, grotesque satire about the decadence of two members of the Georgian aristocracy was produced during the Stalin era and full of bitter laughter.

8. “Arachvelebrevi Gamophena” (Extraordinary Exhibition) – 1968
Directed by Eldar Shengelaya, written by Rezo Gabriadze
A sculptor gives up the dreams of art for a dose of reality. While fathering a brood of children, he learns to find the accidental sweetness in a life of sacrificed ambitions. The film is a spiritual autobiography of the post-war generation in Soviet Georgia.

7. “Ar Idardo” or “Ne Goryuy” (Don’t Grieve) -1969
Directed by Giorgi Daneliya, written by Rezo Gabriadze
The film that made me fall in love with Georgian cinema. A tragi-comedic tale of a country doctor and his exploits in a rugged land, where patients often pay in live chickens.

6. “Sherekilebi” (The Lunatics) – 1973
Directed by Eldar Shengelaya, written by Rezo Gabriadze
A dissident physicist and a young village lad decide — while incarcerated — to put their knowledge of aerodynamics to good use by building a flying machine.

5. “Mimino” – 1977
Directed by Giorgi Danelia, written by Rezo Gabriadze
The greatest crowd pleaser of them all: a story of a Georgian pilot and his Armenian friend who arrive from the Caucasus to big city Moscow.

4. “Blue Mountains, or an Unbelievable story” – 1985
Directed by Eldar Shengelaya, written by Rezo Cheishvili
A late-era Soviet Georgian publishing house where the ceiling is caving in — literally and metaphorically.

3. “13 Tzameti” – 2005
Directed and written by Gela Babluani
An existential thriller based on a game of Russian roulette, created by a young Georgian director living in France.

2. “Broadway 45” – 2007
Directed by Giorgi Maskharashvili
A low-budget story of two young Georgian immigrants trying to make it into the New York art world — by knocking on all the wrong doors.

1. “Der Mann Von Der Botschaft” (The Man from the Embassy) – 2007
Directed by Dito Tsintsadze, written by Tsintsadze and Zaza Rusadze.
A German embassy official in Tbilisi takes in a pubescent street child, with unforeseen results for both.