REZO
The rich inner world of the renowned Georgian screenwriter, artist and puppeteer Rezo Gabriadze is as fantastic as the animation into which he has poured this story of his life. Rezo’s director son, Leo Gabriadze, who previously made the hit horror film Unfriended (2014), leaves it to his father to talk about a life suffused with magical thinking. The movie is an autobiographical animated documentary questioning ideas of deep humanity, kindness and survival during the uneasy times after the 2nd World War.
AWARDS
Special Jury Mention – Go East Festival
Georgian Critics Award – Cinedoc Festival
Best European Independent Documentary Film Award at ÉCU 2018
Best Screenplay and Best Feature Open Russian Festival of Animated Film
Best Animated Movie Asia Pacific Screen Awards
"A great way to plunge into the river of time and geography." - Film.ru
"A cinematic exploration reminiscent of American Splendor." - Hollywood SOAPBOX
"Charmingly personal...Teems with eccentric details." - NY Times
Presented in Russian with English subtitles.
FORMATS: DCP, Blu Ray, MP4
Running time: 75 minutes
About Rezo Gabriadze:
Rezo Gabriadze gained international acclaim as a screenwriter of the classic Soviet classic films: “Don’t Grieve”, “Mimino”, and “Kin-Dza-Dza”. In all, he has written over 35 screenplays. Frustrated with the lack of intellectual freedom during the Soviet era, he turned to puppet theater as a surreptitious way of telling his dramatic stories. In 1981 he founded The Gabriadze Theater – a marionette drama theatre in the old town of Tbilisi. As a painter and graphic artist, Gabriadze has contributed to over 50 books. His works of art can be seen in numerous museums and his iconic sculptures “Chizhik-Pizik”, and “Major Kovalyov’s Nose” in St. Petersburg have become major attractions. In October 2012, Moscow’s Pushkin Fine Arts Museum presented its first major one-man show of Gabriadze’s paintings, drawings and sculptures. Among his many international awards is the “Commander of the Order of Arts and Letters of the French Republic”.
Director: Leo Gabriadze
Leo Gabriadze is a Russian-based movie and commercial director. Since 1995, he has been working at Timur Bekmambetov's production company Bazelevs where he has made more than 100 commercials, many of them award-winning. In 2011 he made his first feature movie Lucky Trouble, and in 2013 he made the horror film Unfriended, with a box office of more than $75 million. Rezo, a labor of love, is his first animated documentary.
Producer: Timur Bekmambetov
Timur Bekmambetov is one of the most successful filmmakers in Russian history, known for Night Watch (2004) and Day Watch (2006), Wanted (2008), "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter" (2012). A visionary filmmaker with a firm grasp of the business aspect of the art form, Bekmambetov invigorates well-worn movie tropes with his uniquely eastern aesthetic.
Creative Team
Director: Leo Gabriadze
Producer: Timur Bekmambetov
Screenplay: Rezo Gabriadze
Editor: Maria Likhacheva
Animators: Sveta Matrosova, Liza Astretsova
Sound: Ivan Titov
Cinematography: Uriy Kokoshkin
VFX: Aleksey Lebedev
Line producers: Timur Asadov, Veronika Belenikina
Rezo will be presented with the animated film Tweet-Tweet
Tweet-Tweet is filmmaker Zhanna Bekmambetova's cinematic debut, an exquisitely rendered portrait of the life cycle brought lovingly to life via a largely silent, Pixar-like journey of the tightrope that is, in many ways, the way we live our lives as we toss n' turn, wobble and stride our way through fears and losses, joys and triumphs at times precariously and at times with remarkable boldness.
Press
Interview with Leo Gabriadze, Sergey Elkin, The Reklama
Review: ‘Rezo’ a charming, animated autobiography of Georgian artist, San Francisco Chronicle
REZO -- A Wonderful Animated Memoir, disappointmentmedia.com
Introducing Rezo – an Animated Biographic Film After the Stories of Rezo Gabriadze, Bosco Di Ciliegi