The Land of the People

The film tells about the most significant church holidays and religious rites.

A film from which you can learn about the first progress of the USSR in space exploration, as well as about the achievements of Yuri Gagarin, the world famous first cosmonaut, who was the very first to conquer the depths of space. This is an educational documentary film for people of all ages. And for those who are nostalgic about the past, and for those who want to learn more about space and its conquest.

The story about a very small god-forgotten village in Siberia reflects the history of Russia from the beginning of the century till the early 1980s. Three generations try to find the land of happiness and to give it to the people. One builds the road through taiga to the star over horizon, the second 'build communism' and the third searches for oil.

The last collaboration of Artavazd Peleshian and cinematographer Mikhail Vartanov is a film-essay about Armenia's shepherds, about the contradiction and the harmony between man and nature, scored to Vivaldi's Four Seasons.

While it was long thought that his filmography had concluded with the film Life in 1993, Peleshian has now returned with a new film, simply titled La Nature, through which he once again observes the delicate cohabitation of human communities with their environment. Gathered from the internet, most of the images that compose the film are fragile, amateur-shot traces from within nature and its tremors that regularly rock these communities. Volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, and tsunamis form the film’s visual fabric, and are set against images of grandiose natural landscapes. A visual elegy, the film resolutely acknowledges the superiority of nature, with its unrelenting force, capable of transcending all human ambition. With this, the filmmaker seems to remind us that humankind will not emerge victorious from the ecological havoc that it has created.

The tranquility of a remote Armenian mountain community is disrupted when a group of shepherds affected by the pangs of an evening hunger, decide to butcher and barbecue the sheep of another's that have strayed into their herd. An official inquiry by the city police complicates matters, and questions of law, morality and community only seem to lead to further entanglements.

Peleshian transforms footage from a train ride into a metaphor for the shape of a life. Early images of faces on the train give way to landscape, a journey through a black tunnel, and a final emergence into pure white light.

Poetic essay about the beginning of life from labor pains and birth and about its symbolic meaning.

Inhabitants depicts animals in panic: the film is mostly filled with shots of mass migrations and stampedes (some, surprisingly, filmed from a helicopter). The title equalizes the species of the earth. Artavazd Peleshian merely alludes to the presence of human beings—a few silhouettes that seem to be the cause of these vast, anxious movements of animal fear. In many ways, this film is an ode to the animal world that moves toward formal abstraction, with clouds of silver birds pulverizing light. Peleshian said, “It’s hard to give a verbal synopsis of these films. Such films exist only on the screen, you have to see them.”

Monumental picture exploring the identity and fate of the Armenian nation.

Philosophical essay about the October Revolution of 1917 in Russia, its influence on the destiny of the world in the 20th century.

A man paves his own way to his own soul through an intellectual quest, tragedies of nations and personal drama. The road moving through the cosmic distances is a flight into one's internal world. This flight and this drama are revealed in this philosophical film-poem.

Poetic film about the struggle of man's will and muscles against nature, about the rock-climbers who prevent landslides and eliminate their consequences.