City of the Sun

The lives, dreams and destinies of extraordinary characters unfold amidst the ruins of a semi-abandoned mining town. Chiatura is a city in Western Georgia. There was a time when it was responsible for supplying 50% of the world’s manganese and at its peak; the mine employed up to 10,000 workers. Today, with drastically reduced manganese production, dangerous working conditions and little prospect for any improvement, it is well on its way to becoming a ghost town. Music teacher keeps demolishing the city to build a new life for himself and his family; miner-turned-actor lives in a limbo unable to make a decision between his passion (theatre) and money (working at the mines); and two malnourished champion athletes have to keep running just to survive.

Awards

Madrid International Documentary Film Festival – Best International Feature Film, 2017
Sarajevo Film Festival – IDFA Award, 2016
Sheffield International Documentary Film Festival – Art Doc Award, 2017
Wiesbaden Go East – Award of the Federal Foreign Office, 2017

Rati Oneli

Rati Oneli was born in 1977, Tbilisi. He has lived in New York from 1999 to 2014 where he was studying International affairs at Columbia University. His master thesis was on Middle East Studies. He currently pursues PhD in Philosophy at the European Graduate School. In 2014, he produced and co-edited Invisible Spaces, a short film that was nominated for Palme d’Or at Cannes Film Festival.

Film sessions

09.29 Friday
  • Skalvija (Vilnius) 18:30 Presentation

09.30 Saturday
  • Senamiesčio „Pasaka“ (Vilnius) 19:00 Presentation


Information

Director: Rati Oneli 
Screenplay: Dea Kulumbegashvili, Rati Oneli
Cinematography: Arseni Khachaturan
Editing: Ramiro Suarez
Sound: Andrey Dergachev, Alexey Kobzar, Sonia Matrosova
Producer: Jim Stark
Production: OFA / Office of Film Architecture
Georgia, USA, Qatar, Netherlands, 2017, orig. language, english, lithuanian subtitle, 104'