The Lighthouse

Mayak
a film by Maria Saakyan

This elegiac, semi-autobiographical, humanist drama unfolds against the backdrop of the Caucasus wars that plagued Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan during the early 1990s. It is the story of a young woman, Lena, who has decided to return to her home in a remote, war-ravaged Armenian village to try to persuade her grandparents to leave with her for safety in Moscow. After spending several years in Moscow, Lena now journeys to the small mountain village where she was born and where her relatives and friends still live. The war and misery of the region are a counterpoint to the memories and emotions that bind Lena to her roots. Will she stay or flee? Lena's journey through her devastated homeland becomes a poetic journey of discovery.

Director Maria Saakyan was born in Yerevan, Armenia. As a 12-year-old girl she was forced to move with her family to Moscow, because of the war in the Caucasus. She comments on the inspiration for the film and the autobiographical nature of its main character: "This is a personal story not just for me but it is a story which has been part of the autobiography of many people of our generation. This is a personal story also for our screenwriter, who is Georgian, for our set-designer, who is from Serbia. We were all forced to leave our home countries because of local wars. And this very strong desire to return, to come back home to the country you were forced to leave, brings us to this film. For us, it was more important to try to reflect the personal truth about these 1990s local wars. We tried to make a film not only about the Nagorno-Karabakh war or the Georgian war, but one which could be understood globally."

Told with a striking emphasis on the cinematic image and set to a hypnotic soundtrack, this outstanding, award-winning directorial debut captures a dream-like emotional resonance of gender, place and culture. Haunting, mysterious and unforgettable, it combines documentary and personal perspective with visuals of immense power and beauty, as it examines themes of family, memory, war and displacement.