Grzeli nateli dgeebi

I don't believe I've ever seen a Georgian film before watching In Bloom, but it was a great place to start and I'll certainly be looking more into Georgian cinema.

Like many coming of age stories the film focuses on two young teenage girls, but unlike most typical American or European films, the background for this film involves a country that has recently overcome one violent coup and is in the middle of a civil war. Screenwriter and co-director Nana Ekvtimishvili handles these details with lovely subtlety never making them feel heavy handed or overt. The camera- work for the film is also a knock out. The cinematographer, Oleg Mutu, is the same one responsible for the Romanian masterpiece 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days, and he flawlessly employs the steady hand and long takes he used in that movie to great effect here. There is a beautiful 5 minute scene that is a one shot take of one of the girls dancing and it is the perfect meld of technical camera-work and physical performance.

I would be remiss of course not to mention the acting of the two lead girls who are simply fantastic. And while they are both strong actresses, it's Lika Babluani, in a much quieter performance, who is devastating. She has a face made for cinema and she can carry those long takes and fill them up with her presence without feeling laboured or strained.