Welcome back to the deep dive. So today we are
we're traveling Mentally, at least. Always the
best way to travel on a budget. Right, exactly.
We are heading over to the Southern Caucasus.
Yes. Specifically to a city that holds this incredible
title of being one of the oldest continuously
inhabited cities in the world. Yeah, Yurovan,
Armenia. Yurovan. And we're not just there for,
you know, the sightseeing or a standard history
lesson. We're actually looking at a cultural
phenomenon that has managed to turn this historic
capital into a massive and honestly surprising
hub for... It really is surprising. Or, if you
want to be linguistically accurate, and I always
think the local name carries a bit more flavor,
it's Voskitsiron. Voskitsiron. That sounds really
poetic. It is. It literally translates to golden
apricot. And honestly, I mean, in the world of
film festivals where everything is a golden lion
or a bear or a palm. A fruit is a bold choice.
It's a very distinct choice. Naming your festival
after a fruit just stands out. It sounds delicious,
honestly. But before we get totally distracted
by the fruit, let's set the stage for you listening.
Because when most people think of the International
Film Festival circuit, they have a very specific
bingo card in their head. Right. Con, Venice,
Toronto. Swiss and Dance, exactly. So why are
we dedicating an entire deep dive to the Golden
Apricot? Like, what is the mission here and why
does this specific festival matter? Well, it's
a fascinating case study in how a festival actually
defines a nation's cultural standing, because
this isn't just about rolling out a red carpet
and popping champagne for celebrities. Right.
The mission statement of the Golden Apricot right
from the start is crossroads of cultures and
civilizations. Which is a pretty heavy title.
That is a lot of pressure to put on a film festival.
It is, yeah. But it fits the geography perfectly
when you think about it. You have to remember
exactly where Armenia sits on the map. It's right
at that intersection of east and west, north
and south. It's a literal bridge. Exactly. And
since it was founded in 2004, this festival hasn't
just been about showing movies. It's been actively
trying to depict the richness of the human experience
by bringing together diverse nations, diverse
religions, people who might not... otherwise
sit in the same room. So our goal today is to
figure out how a festival founded in 2004, which,
let's be honest, is relatively young in festival
years, managed to attract some of the absolute
heaviest hitters in cinema history. You're talking
actual legends. And we also need to look at how
it navigates the tricky waters of cultural expression
in a region that is constantly in flux. So we
have a really great stack of sources here to
go through. We've got the festival's history,
their award records, organizational structure,
and some news reports on a few specific controversies
that popped up. Let's unpack it. I want to go
back to the start. 2004. It was a different world.
It really was. The early 2000s were a weird time
for media. Streaming didn't exist yet. Digital
projection was just barely starting out. And
over in Yerevan, something very specific was
brewing. So who actually sits down and decides
we need a massive international film festival
right now? Well, it was a collaborative effort,
but the crucial thing is it was driven by artists.
This wasn't some corporate boardroom decision
or a tourist board initiative. Okay. You had
the Golden Apricot Fund for Cinema Development
working with the Armenian Association of Film
Critics and Cinema Journalists. But the key figure,
the real engine behind the whole thing, is Harutyun
Kachatryan. He's a general director. Okay, correct.
And he's a filmmaker himself. Which changes things.
Completely. That distinction matters so much.
When a festival is run by an actual filmmaker,
The priorities are just different. It becomes
about the art first, not just the distribution
deals or the market. But they also knew that
just being a local Armenian festival wouldn't
get them the global eyes they wanted. They needed
to put it on the map immediately. So to give
it that international weight right out of the
gate, they brought in Adam Magoyan. The Canadian
director, the guy who did the suite hereafter.
The very same. Adam Egoyan is arguably the most
famous director of the Armenian diaspora. He's
massive in Canada, massive in Europe. So he was
named president of the festival in 2005, and
he currently serves as the honorary chairman.
That feels like a strategic masterstroke, honestly.
You just put Egoyan's name on the letterhead
and suddenly the whole industry has to pay attention.
It's instant credibility. It tells the global
film community, hey, this is serious. We aren't
playing around here. And the vibe they cultivated?
Based on the sources, it wasn't just let's watch
Hollywood blockbusters in Armenia. Not at all.
It was specifically designed to present new works
by filmmakers in Armenia, but also foreign cinematographers
of Armenian descent alongside major international
directors. So a real mix. Yeah, it was all about
promoting originality in cinema and video art.
And looking at the organizational chart here,
this wasn't just some scrappy indie basement
project. They had serious institutional backing.
Oh, absolutely. They had the backing of the Ministry
of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Culture
of Armenia. This was treated as a major national
priority from day one. I want to look at the
architecture of the festival itself for a second,
because they have some really unique names for
their awards. As you mentioned earlier, they
leaned all the way into the fruit branding. They
really did commit to the apricot. The Grand Prix,
which is the big prize for best feature or best
documentary, is the golden apricot. Naturally.
Then you have the special prize, which is the
silver apricot. That's a pretty standard hierarchy.
Yeah, gold, silver, makes sense. But my favorite
one, and the one that I think shows the most
thoughtfulness from the organizers, is the award
for the short film competition. It's called the
apricot stone. The pit. Yeah. See, my very first
reaction when I read that was that getting a
stone sounds like you came in last place. Yeah.
Like you're getting a lump of coal for Christmas.
I can definitely see that interpretation. But
think about the metaphor behind it. What actually
is... A stone or a pit. It's a seed. Exactly.
It's the potential for a tree. A short film is
so often the very beginning of a director's career.
It's the kernel of their talent. Oh, wow. Yeah.
So calling it the apricot stone implies that
this is just the start of something that is going
to grow. Okay. That is surprisingly poetic. Yeah.
I completely take it back. I like the stone.
It's lovely. But there's another award here that
really caught my eye. It sounds like something
straight out of a history book or maybe a fantasy
novel. Parajanov's Fowler. Yes, this jumped out
at me too in the notes. This is the Lifetime
Achievement Award, correct? Yes, and for anyone
who loves cinema history, this is basically the
Holy Grail of references. It's named in honor
of the legendary director Sergei Parajanov. And
for those who might not know, who was he? He
was a Soviet Armenian director who made these
incredibly visual films like The Color of Pomegranates.
He is widely considered one of the greatest visual
stylists in the entire history of movies. His
work literally looks like moving paintings. Wow.
But more importantly for the context of this
award, he was heavily persecuted by the Soviet
regime. He was imprisoned. His films were banned.
He genuinely suffered for his art. So winning
Parajanov's Thaler isn't just getting a gold
star for a long career. It's a nod from the absolute
gods of arthouse cinema. Precisely. It connects
you directly to that legacy of artistic resistance.
It's a very, very heavy honor in the film world.
Now, in terms of the structure of the categories,
the festival isn't just one big melting pot of
films. They have the International Feature Competition.
They have the International Documentary Competition.
But they also carve out something called the
Armenian Panorama. And this is such a crucial
piece of the puzzle for a regional festival,
because if you only import foreign films, you
aren't really a festival. You're just a cinema
hall playing foreign movies. Right. The Armenian
Panorama is a specific national competition for
both fiction and documentary films. And it's
vital because it highlights local talent right
alongside the global giants. It ensures the festival
actually incubates Armenian creativity. It prevents
the local artists from just getting completely
drowned out by the big international names. Exactly.
And speaking of global integration, I see in
the sources they didn't just stop at showing
movies. In 2005, they initiated a network called
Directors Across Borders. Which sounds a lot
like a diplomatic initiative. In a way, it definitely
is. It's a network for filmmakers across the
region. And remember, the Caucasus is a region
with very complex borders and several frozen
conflicts. Yeah, it's not a simple map. a network
specifically called Directors Across Borders
is a massive statement in itself. And since 2005,
the festival has actually functioned under the
aegis of the European Cultural Parliament. And
then in 2010, they were awarded the FICTS Plate
d 'honneur. So they've really built this institutional
framework that actively connects Armenia to Europe
and the wider world. Right. They made themselves
completely indispensable to the cultural conversation
in that entire region. OK, so we keep seeing
global giants and heavy hitters. I think we need
to prove it to you listening. Because when I
first looked at the list of past winners in our
source material, I genuinely did a double take.
It's shocking. I assumed it would be smaller
regional films that maybe I hadn't heard of.
I was completely wrong. It is an incredibly impressive
list. It frankly rivals the lineups you'd see
in Berlin or Venice. Let's look at the features.
2004, the inaugural year. Who wins best feature?
Adam Egoyen for his film Ararat. Wait a minute.
The same guy who became the president of the
festival the very next year. I know. I know.
It looks a little suspicious on paper, but to
be perfectly fair to them, he wasn't president
yet. True. And Ararat is a deeply seminal film.
It's this massive, profound exploration of the
Armenian genocide. So for the very first festival
in Yerevan. It was really the only logical choice
to set the tone. Okay, I'll give him a pass on
that one. But look at 2005. Alexander Sakharov
wins for The Sun, and Sakharov is an absolute
titan of Russian cinema. He did Russian Arc,
right? Yes, the movie shot in a single continuous
take through the Hermitage. The Sun is his film
about Emperor Hirohito. This is high art, deeply
intellectual cinema. And then 2006, Hu Shao -Sien
wins for three times. He is basically Taiwanese
royalty in the film world. Exactly. So in just
the first three years, you have the Armenian
diaspora, the Russian masters, and the Asian
avant -garde all represented in winning the top
prize. That Crossroads motto wasn't just PR talk.
But the one that really stands out to me, the
one that proves they almost have a crystal ball
for talent, is 2011. Asghar Farhadi. Asghar Farhadi
for A Separation. Now, you follow movies, you
probably know that film because it went on to
win the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.
It became this massive global sensation. But
it won the Golden Apricot first. Exactly. That
shows this festival has its finger right on the
pulse. They identified that masterpiece long
before the Academy Awards did. It completely
validates their programming. They also seem to
really lean into very intense, artistically demanding
films. In 2012, Sergela Znitsa won for In the
Fog. In 2014, Miroslav Slavoshvitsky for The
Tribe. And in 2015, Cyril Guerra won for Embrace
of the Serpent, which is this incredible black
-and -white psychedelic trip into the Amazon.
Yeah, these are definitely not popcorn flicks.
No. And the documentaries they program are just
as hard -hitting. The sources mention they screened
Burma VJ in 2009 and five broken cameras in 2012.
Those are heavy films. They're about political
resistance, conflict, social justice. It really
reinforces that idea of the crossroads of civilizations,
because sometimes that crossroads is actually
a conflict zone. Now let's talk about the Lifetime
Achievement Hall of Fame. We mentioned Parajan
Ostellar earlier. The list of people who have
actually flown all the way to Yerevan to accept
this award is wild. It is a literal who's who
of global cinema. I'm looking at this list here.
Abbas Kiarostami. Wim Wenders. Two of the most
important directors of the late 20th century.
I mean, Wim Wenders practically invented the
modern road movie. Nikita Mikhalkov. Claudia
Cardinale in 2010. Theo Angelopoulos. Fanny Ardent.
Bella Tarr. And of course, in 2013, Charles Aznavour.
The singer. The legend. He is a massive cultural
icon for both France and Armenia. He's often
called the Frank Sinatra of France. But for Armenians,
he is even more than that. He's a national hero.
Wow. Having him attend the festival is like having
royalty show up. And let's not forget the glamour
factor, too. Nastasja Kinski and Ornella Muti
received it in 2015, Jacqueline Vissette in 2016.
It really paints a picture of a festival that,
despite being located in a smaller country, punches
way, way above its weight class. Absolutely.
But when you are dealing with art and culture
in a complex political region, it hasn't been
without friction. No, it hasn't. And we have
to address this because the source material goes
into it, and it's important. The Crossroads mission
isn't always smooth sailing. Right. This is where
we get to the promise we made at the start of
the deep dive. We aren't just here to list winners
and praise the event. We need to talk about what
happened in 2017. 2017 was a very difficult year
for the festival. It was a moment where that
core mission of being a diverse platform really
got tested. So what exactly does the source say
happened? Well, the organizers canceled a specific
off -competition program. It was called Armenians
Internal and External Views. And initially there
was no official reason given. It just sort of
disappeared from the schedule. And in the information
age, you can't just... Delete a program and hope
nobody notices. Exactly. Activists and social
media users immediately flagged the removal.
The claim, and this was widely reported at the
time, was that the cancellation was due to the
inclusion of two specific films in that program.
Which films? One was called Apricot Groves, and
the other was, listen to me, Untold Stories Beyond
Hatred. What was the common thread between those
two? They were both LGBTQ themed films. So immediate
allegations of censorship. Yes. LGBTQ rights
organizations, specifically Pink Armenia and
Galas, criticized the move heavily. They labeled
it as outright censorship, arguing that the festival
bowed to pressure to remove queer narratives
from the screen. And the fallout from this was
significant, right? This wasn't just a minor
local dispute. No, it escalated quickly. Internally,
the people we just established as the pillars
of the festival spoke out. Adam Egoyan and Arsene
Kanjian. publicly denounced the cancellation.
Wow. There was an open letter that circulated,
signed by numerous filmmakers and politicians.
That is a lot of internal pressure from your
own honorary chairman. It is. And externally,
it became an institutional issue. The EU's Eastern
Partnership Civil Society Forum actually issued
a statement regarding the incident. What did
they say? They stated that the cancellation ran
contrary to the process of Armenia joining the
Creative Europe program. Okay, that's a really
big deal. Yeah. That explicitly ties international
funding and European cooperation. to these programming
decisions. It does. It perfectly highlights the
tension that festivals in conservative or transitioning
societies so often face. On one hand, they want
the international prestige and the openness of
a global film festival. But on the other hand,
local political or social pressures can push
back hard against certain content. It's a stark
reminder that a film festival isn't just floating
in a bubble. It exists within the reality of
the society that hosts it. We are just reporting
what the sources outline here, but it's clear
it was a major flashpoint. Precisely. It forces
the ultimate question. If your motto is crossroads
of cultures, do you allow all cultures to cross?
Or do you put up roadblocks for some? That is
the real challenge. But looking at the timeline
we have, the festival didn't collapse after 2017.
It continued. It did. It survived the controversy
and continued to operate and evolve. Which brings
us to the modern era of the festival. We have
data here on the most recent edition discussed
in our source material. That's the 22nd edition,
held in July 2025. Right. And looking at that
2025 lineup, you can see they are still aiming
for that very high art international standard.
They haven't retreated into just playing it safe.
The opening film was, it was just an accident.
Directed by Jafar Panahi. And Panahi is another
name that carries so much weight. For those who
don't know, he's an Iranian filmmaker who has
faced imprisonment and actual legal bans on making
films in his own country. Yet he keeps producing
absolute masterpieces, often in secret. So opening
your festival with him sends a very specific
message. It absolutely does. It signals solidarity
with artistic freedom. It says to the world,
we stand with the filmmakers who are being silenced,
which is a very strong choice, especially given
the festival's own past history with the censorship
controversy. And then for the closing film, they
went with a classic. a film called Last Station
from 1994, which was directed by Haruchun Kachatryan,
the festival director, and Nora Armani. It's
a really nice way to tie the history of the event
back to its original founders. I also love looking
at the venues they use for the 2025 edition because
it really helps visualize the city for us. We've
got the Moscow Cinema and the Nyeri Cinema. Those
are the historic movie palaces of Yervon. Just
beautiful, old school cinema architecture. But
they also utilize the opera and ballet theater
and something called Lover's Park. Yes, the Bogotian
Gardens. Just imagine screening films outdoors
in a park named Lover's Park. in the middle of
a warm Yerevan summer. The atmosphere must be
just incredible. It sounds magical. It turns
the city itself into a theater. And that is really
the ultimate goal of a festival like this, to
engage the public, to make it a civic event,
not just an industry mixer for the critics. So
we've covered the origins, the fruit -themed
awards, the international stars, and the internal
struggles. When you step back and look at the
Golden Apricot as a whole, What do you think
is the big takeaway? I think it's a really unique
synthesis. You have the Armenian panorama keeping
the national identity alive, ensuring that local
Armenian stories are told and funded. But then
at the exact same time, you have Wim Wenders
and Jafar Panahi and Asghar Farhadi bringing
the entire globe to Yerevan. It really does live
up to that motto. Crossroads of cultures. It
does. And the thing about a crossroads is that
it implies traffic. It implies collision. Sometimes
that collision is beautiful, like a great international
co -production or a shared artistic idea. And
sometimes it's messy, like the 2017 controversy.
But that's exactly what makes it vital. If it
were easy, it wouldn't be a crossroads. It would
just be a highway. And highways are boring. That's
a great way to put it. A crossroads is where
things actually happen. Exactly. And it forces
us to ask a much bigger question, one that I
think you listening should really consider. We
so often think of film festivals as just entertainment
events or industry trade shows. Sure, places
to sell movies. Right. But for a smaller nation
like Armenia, is a festival like the Golden Apricot
actually a diplomatic engine? Oh, that's interesting.
Like an exercise in soft power. Think about it.
It actively forces the country to engage with
global standards of free expression. It brings
in foreign dignitaries, journalists and artists
who might never have visited otherwise. It puts
the country squarely on the cultural map. That's
very true. So you have to wonder, does a well
-run film festival do more for a country's global
standing than a traditional diplomatic summit?
It's the difference between politics and culture.
Politics draws the lines on a map, but culture
is what actually crosses them. Precisely. That
is a fascinating thought. Are the movies just
the vehicle for something much, much bigger?
We will leave you with that to mull over. And
maybe go find a short film to watch today. Find
your own golden stone. Exactly. Thanks for diving
in with us. We'll see you on the next one.