Varvara Hovhannisyan • Directrice du département international du Festival international du film de l'Abricot d'or
“Depuis plusieurs années, notre principal objectif est de faire du festival une plaque tournante pour le cinéma de la région, et nous y sommes presque”
par Ola Salwa
- Entretien avec la responsable du département international sur la mission du festival arménien et la manière dont il stimule la production dans le pays et la région

Cet article est disponible en anglais.
Cineuropa sat down with Varvara Hovhannisyan, head of the International Department at the Golden Apricot International Film Festival (GAIFF), who discussed the festival’s objectives and how it has stimulated local production in Armenia. The opening film of this year’s edition was Jafar Panahi’s Palme d’Or winner It Was Just an Accident [+lire aussi :
critique
bande-annonce
fiche film], which was screened in the presence of the director. The 22nd GAIFF unspools from 13-20 July.
Cineuropa: A lot of festivals have so-called mission statements. What is yours?
Varvara Hovhannisyan: For the past several years, our main goal has been to make the festival a platform for regional cinema – and we’re getting there. By “regional”, I mean films produced in countries across the South Caucasus and beyond. These are represented in both our industry platform and the regional competition. We have noticed that at many other festivals, it’s hard to find a strong selection of films from Armenia, Iran, Georgia or Azerbaijan. Unfortunately, we don’t usually receive submissions from Azerbaijan – they’re not eager to apply – but we remain open. Over the years, we’ve built an extensive network that consists of not only filmmakers and producers, but also sales companies and distributors. Golden Apricot is the only event in Armenia where you can watch arthouse cinema because we don’t have an arthouse distribution system here.
The representation looks solid this year. I counted at least 20 Armenian films, short and mid-length productions included, in this year’s programme. Does that mean production capacity is growing in the region?
For sure. Around seven years ago, there were no more than five Armenian films a year, and many films were made by directors from the diaspora. Now, we have Armenian movies being produced by local companies or being made as co-productions with several countries. I am sure that it's also a result of the work done by the industry platform, GAIFF Pro. Many of these films were presented as projects at the market.
Would you say that the festival’s efforts encourage the National Cinema Centre of Armenia to further subsidise local production?
I think it's all a result of cooperation. Both the festival and the Cinema Fund of Armenia, which operated before the NCCA, have always worked together very closely. We try to help one another. If the NCCA has projects that it wants to focus on, we try to emphasise these projects more. And the NCCA is very supportive when it comes to screenings of the films at the festival. So, overall, it’s a very friendly form of cooperation that gets results. They’ve been doing a great job for the past several years. You can’t even compare the number of Armenian productions now to what it was before – no more than five films [a year], often produced by the same group of people. Now, the landscape is more diverse. The Armenian industry still faces challenges when it comes to feature-film production, mainly because of the budgets, but we have very good results when it comes to shorts and documentaries.
Golden Apricot also has a strong international programme with high-profile guests. This year, they include Jafar Panahi, Abderrahmane Sissako and Athina Rachel Tsangari. How do you make these connections?
There is a list of filmmakers whom we have dreamed of bringing to Armenia since the festival began 22 years ago. We have been negotiating for many years with some of them. For example, we talked to the Dardenne brothers for five years, and they came the sixth year. We never lose hope. Amir Naderi is another example – we were in touch with him for several years, until he finally came this year. The filmmakers we reach out to usually know Golden Apricot and are interested in attending. However, sometimes Armenia is difficult to reach – it’s not a very common travel destination.
We try to reach most of the filmmakers directly, through our personal connections, which has got easier over time. Some directors recommend us to their friends. We also have “ambassadors” like Marco Muller, who helps us get in touch with directors and encourages them to come to Armenia.
Is there anyone special on your “wish list”?
Definitely Martin Scorsese. We were in touch with him two years ago, and it almost happened. If we manage to bring him, it would be a dream come true not just for our team, but also for the Armenian audience. Unfortunately, cinema – arthouse cinema in particular – is not very popular with the local audience. Sometimes when we have international guests with recognisable names, it resonates with them. For example, the reunion of Jafar Panahi and Amir Naderi during our opening gala went viral. Even if people didn’t know these filmmakers before, they saw the information, it caught their attention, and they decided to look at the festival’s programme. We have good results when it comes to attendance.
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