Otar Iosseliani spent a career making gently anarchic comedies about people who refuse to be useful — wine-factory workers, a percussionist who is always late, layabouts with better things to do. The retrospective opens with his Soviet-Georgian years: a 1958 shorts program, the wine-harvest satire Falling Leaves, and There Once Was a Singing Blackbird, the drummer film that got him shelved by the authorities. A perfect door in.
What to expect
Three programs run back-to-back in a single afternoon block, so you can treat it as a mini-marathon or just pick one. All screen in Georgian with English subtitles and none runs past about 100 minutes. Metrograph's repertory audience is attentive and the upstairs bar makes the gaps between films painless.
Good to know
- Metrograph is on Ludlow Street on the Lower East Side; the F at East Broadway and the B/D at Grand Street are closest.
- The opening films are short enough to stack, so plan for an afternoon rather than a single screening.
- Everything screens in Georgian with English subtitles.
- The retrospective continues with his later French-period titles, so a missed film is not necessarily a missed chance.
- Members book first, which matters for Metrograph's smaller second screen.
- The Commissary upstairs is a good between-films stop and takes its own reservations.
Get Saturday planned every Thursday
One email a week — the best of the NYC weekend board. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Common questions
Who was Otar Iosseliani?
A Georgian director who worked under Soviet censorship before relocating to France, known for wry, nearly plotless comedies about people avoiding work and authority.
Which film should I pick if I can only see one?
There Once Was a Singing Blackbird — a portrait of a perpetually distracted orchestra percussionist that is the warmest and most accessible of the three.
Are these new restorations?
Metrograph does not list formats for this series on its calendar, so ask at the box office if print versus digital matters to you.
More this weekend
