TEN MINUTES BEFORE THE FLIGHT OF ICARUS
This film is considered to be a manifesto of the post-Soviet generation of Lithuanian filmmakers who rejected the straightforward declarative approach and immersed themselves into the silent observation of reality. Arūnas Matelis captures Užupis – a historical quarter of the old town of Vilnius. One of the heroes is a tiny fellow with an ear-flap cap whose idiom is a mosaic of Lithuanian, Russian, Polish and Yiddish words. This character is like a walking spirit of Užupis – scanty yet free.
Lithuania 1990 / 10:00 / Director: Aruˉnas Matelis
EARTH OF THE BLIND
The roar of the slaughterhouse is juxtaposed with the quiet and peaceful presence of the two characters and the animals. A man is travelling confidently through the mud in a creaking wheelchair. The trembling hands of an old woman holds the hay which the goats are calmly munching on. With a poetic approach Stonys blurs the line between the visible and invisible worlds. In 1992 the film received the FELIX Award for the Best European Documentary Film.
Lithuania 1992 / 25:00 / Director: Audrius Stonys
BLACK BOX
In this experimental documentary, film director Algimantas Maceina reveals the theme of the exile of Lithuanian society from a very personal perspective. He films the repatriation of the remains of his grandfather from Siberia to Lithuania. This personal approach to a societal tragedy – the genocide caused by the Soviet regime – links the personal to collective memory and erases the boundaries between personal film archives and publicly acknowledged films.
Lithuania 1994 / 41:00 / Director: Algimantas Maceina
EUROPA 54 54 '-25 19'
Europa 54 54′-25 19′ is a 16 mm film documentation of the trip the artist made one Friday morning back in the 90’s, from his former flat to the geographical centre of Europe. In the soundtrack of the film it is possible to hear what the motivation is for making this journey. The camera travels through non-spectacular parts of Vilnius towards the spot, which is just a few kilometres away from the outskirts of the town.
Lithuania 1997 / 8:00 / Director: Deimantas Narkevičius
ALDONA
Artist and filmmaker Emilija Škarnulytė follows her grandmother Aldona on a daily walk through a sculpture park of Soviet-era statues. Aldona lost her sight in 1986, probably due to the Chernobyl disaster. Through a personal approach Škarnulytė addresses the political and historical layers of the past that continue to live within us.
Lithuania 2013 / 13:00 / Director: Emilija Škarnulyte ̇