Seasons of the Year
{{short description|Soviet/Armenian 1975 documentary film}}
{{Infobox film
| name = Seasons of the Year
| image = Seasons_of_the_Year_title_card.jpg
| native_name = {{Infobox name module|hy|Տարվա եղանակները}}
| caption = Title card
| director = Artavazd Peleshyan
| producer =
| writer =Artavazd Peleshyan
| starring =
| music = Tigran Mansurian
| cinematography =Mikhail Vartanov
| studio = Armenfilm
| distributor =
| released = {{Film date|1975}}
| runtime = 29 minutes
| country = Soviet Union
| language = Armenian (minimal dialogue)
Russian intertitles
| budget =
}}
Seasons of the Year ({{langx|hy|Տարվա եղանակները|Tarva yeghanaknery}}; {{Langx|ru|Времена года|Vremena goda}}),{{Cite web|url=https://www.sabzian.be/film/vremena-goda|title=Vremena goda | Sabzian|website=www.sabzian.be}} also called The Seasons or Four Seasons,{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LluGAAAAIAAJ&q=%22Seasons%22+1975+Peleshian.|title=Our Century|first1=Artavazd|last1=Peleshi͡an|first2=Gerald|last2=Matt|first3=Ursula Blickle|last3=Stiftung|first4=Kunsthalle|last4=Wien|date=October 14, 2004|publisher=Kerber|isbn=9783936646603 |via=Google Books}} is a 1975 Soviet–Armenian short documentary film, directed and written by Artavazd Peleshyan.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7O4zAAAAIAAJ&dq=%22Seasons%22+1975+Peleshian.&pg=PA124|title=Kinoglasnost: Soviet Cinema in Our Time|first=Anna|last=Lawton|date=November 26, 1992|publisher=CUP Archive|isbn=9780521388146 |via=Google Books}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.idfa.nl/en/article/160804/the-afterimages-of-artavazd-pelechian|title=The Afterimages of Artavazd Pelechian | IDFA|first=Oberon Amsterdam|last=www.oberon.nl|website=www.idfa.nl}} It was his second and last collaboration with cinematographer Mikhail Vartanov, after Autumn Pastoral (1971).{{Cite web|url=https://parajanov.com/seasons/|title=Seasons|date=February 9, 2017}}
Production
Seasons of the Year was filmed by Mikhail Vartanov in black-and-white on 35 mm film in the Armenian SSR.{{Cite web|url=https://www.sensesofcinema.com/2012/great-directors/artavazd-pelechian/|title=Pelechian, Artavazd – Senses of Cinema|first=Daniel|last=Fairfax|date=29 December 2001 }} It was Peleshyan's first film not using archive footage.{{Cite web|url=https://ii.umich.edu/content/ii-directory/armenian/en/news-events/all-events/archived-events/2011/10/film-series--artavazd-peleshyan-films--the-seasons-of-the-year--.html|title=Film Series. Artavazd Peleshyan films: THE SEASONS OF THE YEAR (1975), WE (1969), OUR CENTURY (1983) | U-M LSA Center for Armenian Studies (CAS)|website=ii.umich.edu}}
Synopsis
The film depicts the struggles of an isolated Armenian farming community against the elements.{{Cite web|url=https://mubi.com/films/seasons-of-the-year|title=Seasons of the Year|via=mubi.com}} Armenian folk music is mixed with Vivaldi's Four Seasons. We see the villagers raising sheep and cattle, rolling haystacks down a hillside, dealing with rain and storms, celebrating a wedding, and sliding down a snowy hill while carrying sheep.
Release
Seasons of the Year was released in 1975. Decades later it became critically admired in the West, showing at the 40th Berlin International Film Festival (1990), CPH:DOX (2003), the 68th Venice International Film Festival (2011) and the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (2012 and 2021). The scene of farmers sliding down the snowy hills with sheep and rolling haystacks down a steep hill have become famous.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Dodrq_doxI4C&q=%22Seasons%22+&pg=PA100|title=A Critical Cinema 3: Interviews with Independent Filmmakers|first=Scott|last=MacDonald|date=October 14, 1998|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=9780520209435 |via=Google Books}}
Legacy
Andrei Ujică listed it among his favourite films, calling it "not a frame too short, not a frame too long."{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Vh9UDgAAQBAJ&dq=%22Seasons%22+1975+Peleshian.&pg=PA142|title=Thinking Reality and Time through Film|first1=José Manuel|last1=Martins|first2=Christine|last2=Reeh|date=March 7, 2017|publisher=Cambridge Scholars Publishing|isbn=9781443879583 |via=Google Books}} Verena Paravel also described seeing it on her first day of film school, calling it "the beginning of a cognitive and creative revolution for me."{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=g3KfDwAAQBAJ&dq=%22Seasons%22+1975+Peleshian.&pg=PA456|title=The Sublimity of Document: Cinema as Diorama|first=Scott|last=MacDonald|date=July 1, 2019|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-005215-7 |via=Google Books}} Ian Christie has written that Seasons of the Year is a "a vivid calendar of land and animal husbandry," comparing it to Salt for Svanetia (1930).{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zreuCwAAQBAJ&dq=%22Seasons%22+1975+Peleshian.&pg=PA76|title=Culture and the Media in the USSR Today|first1=Julian|last1=Graffy|first2=Geoffrey|last2=Hosking|date=August 1, 1989|publisher=Springer|isbn=9781349201068 |via=Google Books}}
It was listed at #47 on Sight & Sound
References
{{reflist}}
External links
- {{IMDb title|0298597}}
- {{YouTube|itHUgSGYW-o|Entire film}}
Category:1975 short documentary films
Category:Films shot in Armenia
Category:Soviet black-and-white films
Category:Armenian black-and-white films
Category:Black-and-white documentary films
Category:Documentary films about agriculture
Category:Documentary films about the Soviet Union