★★★☆☆ Confounding audiences and critics alike at the Rome Film Festival, Sofia International Film Festival and now the 67th Edinburgh Film Festival, Silent Souls director Aleksei Fedorchenko's beguiling and perplexing expedition into the myths and rituals of the Russian Mari - Celestial Wives of the Meadow Mari (Nebesnye zheny lugovykh mari, 2012). Set against the scenic backdrop of the country's vast snow-capped Urals, Celestial Wives is a collection of 23 cinematic vignettes about Mari women - the Mari being a distinct group from the eastern Volga region, purported to be the last remaining practising pagans in Europe.
Fedorchenko takes us on a fractured journey through this mysterious land, culminating in an almost episodic tour of the peculiar customs of almost two-dozen women living within the same rural village, each with their own unique and (often) baffling mannerisms. Celebrating both the traditions of the Mari people and the empowerment of women, Celestial Wives' unstructured...
Fedorchenko takes us on a fractured journey through this mysterious land, culminating in an almost episodic tour of the peculiar customs of almost two-dozen women living within the same rural village, each with their own unique and (often) baffling mannerisms. Celebrating both the traditions of the Mari people and the empowerment of women, Celestial Wives' unstructured...
- 6/25/2013
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
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