the Colour Of pomegranates

OUT 29 January / CERT u / 80 Mins

I’ve always loved the title The Colour Of Pomegranates. It sounds like a parody art film that might turn up on Seinfeld (on a double bill with Rochelle, Rochelle, perhaps?). But there is nothing fake about Sergei Parajanov’s 1969 oddity. A series of episodes in the life of 18thcentury Armenian poet and musician Sayat Nova (stay with me), Pomegranates charts in dream-like tableaux his rise from carpet weaver’s apprentice to court minstrel to archbishop. If the poetic logic wasn’t confusing enough, the male poet is played by female Sofiko Chiaureli, who plays six different roles (still with me?). The imagery, steeped in Armenian religious symbolism, is intoxicating and arresting, so otherworldly it makes Lynch’s Dune look like Coronation Street. It’s a slow, difficult, demanding watch, but it’s the kind of film more mainstream filmmakers rip from. Scorsese called it “pretty much unlike anything in cinema history”. He’s not wrong.