Disclaimer; I received this dvd for free in exchange for my review, I have not been compensated in any other way.
Beyond a simple personal quest and far from a nostalgic narration by an Armenian lacking roots, BACK TO SÖLÖZ, from Palme d’Or winning director Serge Avédikian, is a journey through multiple layers. Check the trailer on Youtube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cguOVX_sZI
Filmed over the course of four trips and thirty-three years, from 1987 to 2019, Avédikian returned to Sölöz, the village of his grandparents located 100 miles south of Istanbul and a stone’s throw from Boursa to address the history of the village: the deportation of the Armenian people who lived there, including Avédikian’s grandfather; exchanges of populations and the settlement of Balkan Muslims in Sölöz; shared histories of lost ancestral lands and exile; the near-erasure of the history of Armenians in Sölöz and in all of Turkey; and a dialogue on possible Armenian-Turkish reconciliation that engages historical truths and identity.
Drawing from his experiences across three decades, Avédikian has delivered a powerful film on the themes of identity, historical truth and reconciliation and a living encounter between two peoples marked by blood, on the spot of one of the greatest human tragedies of the twentieth century.
PROGRAM INFORMATION Type: DVD/Digital (Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, Google) Running Time: 65 minutes Genre: World Cinema/Documentary Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 Audio: Stereo Language: French and Armenian with English Subtitles
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