“First and foremost, it is a rare and unique point of view, one of the very few representatives of Chechen culture in contemporary cinema,” says French producer Alexandra Mélot ahead of the March 27 ParisDOC Work-in-Progress screening of Imago by director Déni Oumar Pitsaev.
The film chronicles Pitsaev’s personal story as he returns to his childhood home. Through him, we gain rare insights into this little-known part of the world. Pitsaev is, as producer Mélot tells us, “a talented author who has privileged access to the valley of Pankisi, an exceptional Chechen ethnic minority in Georgia, backed by the Caucasus mountains, on the other side of Chechnya – where he was born. Imago is an initiation tale about a free-spirited young man’s search for his roots as he confronts the traditional dogmas of his clan, which he left as a teenager to exile in France.”
Director Déni Omar Pitsaev speaks of his experiences as an exile in his director’s notes. “I’d like to forget the war, forget where I come from, or be less affected by it. But this forgetting is impossible, whether within the Chechen community or in European society. ‘Where do you come from?’ I was tirelessly asked in France, Belgium, where my Chechen accent made people smile. It is an almost daily reminder to me: I do not come from here, but from Chechnya. Burden and legacy. Sentence and honour.’
Whilst the film is based on a very personal journey, the themes are also universal, ranging from finding personal freedom, to drawing painful parallels with the current situation in Ukraine. As producer Mélot elucidates, “the challenge of the film is Déni’s attempt of family reconstruction through cinema in a territory to which he belongs only from afar. It reveals the scars of his family caught up in one of the most cruel wars of the 20th century and Déni’s desire for emancipation and freedom as a survivor. He asserts his difference as a man, a bachelor, an artist, amongst his own…The Chechens were the first victims of the regime that’s now at war in Ukraine. Putin came to power by bombing Grozny in 1999. Déni and his family were there. They saw the destruction. They lived it. For twenty-three years, Chechens waited for the world to open its eyes. And now it has. Too late for many, but not for all of them.”
From a cinematic point of view, Mélot tells BDE, “the film adopts an original tone that combines drama with a great sense of humour, a lightness within a situation that may seem tragic at first glance.”
Ultimately though, the people we meet can’t escape the legacy that Putin left behind. “This isn’t a film about war. But war is always there—like a shadow that never leaves,” adds Mélot.
What are the unique aspects of the film in terms of concept and cinematography? Mélot outlines how the team navigated Pitsaev being both director and protagonist. “Imago is an initiatory experience through which the director moves ‘in the first person’, by being physically present in the frame and guiding the narrative.”
“The dramaturgy he constructs is made up of cinema direct sequences. The film’s point of view creates empathy with the viewer, through the director/protagonist…The cinematographers had to document the physical journey of Déni as a character, while at the same time interpreting his own subjectivity as a director. The film is structured like a performance, over the course of a summer in which Déni reveals his dream house to his family members.”
Pitsaev’s director notes expand on this approach. “The film will be a documentary tale: I will move through this almost unknown world, seeking to understand its special codes, often fearing what I’ll find behind a door, while yearning to push it open… and doing so. I will play on the ambiguity of my situation: both external and internal to the village, both Chechen and yet foreign.”
Indeed, he hopes that we’ll make discoveries alongside him. “After this encounter with this valley and its unusual and troubling atmosphere, after this journey that invokes the past, and the difference but also the simplicity of our childhood dreams, I’d like the viewer to feel themselves maturing as I think I did after this journey. Grown up, but without losing a bit of their childlike soul,” Pitsaev adds.
Pitsaev and Mélot’s team are, according to the producer, composed of highly skilled and experienced people. The DOPs are Joachim Philippe (Augure) and Sylvain Verdet (Braguino), who worked alongside sound engineers André Rigaut, Marie Paulus and Joseph Squire, both of whom accompanied the shooting in different periods.
In addition, says Mélot of the team, “Renowned editors Dounia Sichov and Laurent Sénéchal, (Oscar-nominated editor with Anatomie d’une chute) both collaborated one after the other on this construction of the film. As for sound post-production, [we worked with] Hélène Clerc-Denizot for the sound editing, and on the mixing side, the famous mixer Emmanuel de Boissieu.”
Quizzed on the film’s selection for the ParisDOC presentation this week, Mélot is clear on the desired outcome. “We are looking for a distributor and a sales agent committed to the film, and also to get in contact with festival programmers in order to be able to find the best way to share the film with the international public.”
Imago is currently in post-production and at end-of-edit stage, with a predicted completion date of May 2025. The opportunity to speak to professional audiences at markets and festivals has been invaluable in progressing the project, Mélot tells BDE.
“The selection of Imago during its development in various international markets and festivals that showcase young emerging filmmakers, such as Eurodoc, Cinedoc Tbilisi, IDFAcademy, Locarno Filmmaker’s Academy, Dok Leipzig copromarket, Sheffield Meet Market and the support of highly selective funds and broadcasters like the Sundance Institute, Avance sur recettes, Eurimages, ARTE Cinéma and RTBF among others, have given the project greater visibility with international programmers, broadcasters and distributors. Our selection for the Hot DOCS FORUM pitch in 2024 in Toronto, bears witness to this: we therefore already know that the film will be of interest in distribution territories such as the USA and Canada,” says Mélot.
Mélot is confident the project will find audiences across age, gender and border divides, and, perhaps, provide us with some answers. “Thanks to Déni being a bridge between many worlds, we enter a community that, in a way, bears a destiny and a fundamental question: what can be rebuilt when war has destroyed the future of a booming society, and how do we survive the ties that bound these men and women together in their intimate and imaginary world?”
Mélot sums up the film’s broad-ranging appeal to different groups. “The committed nature of the film and its resonance with contemporary issues will undoubtedly bring it to the attention of the younger generation, those who identify with the search for gender identity and the deconstruction of patriarchy, movements that are very strong in the world today.”
