What kind of feeling arises when we have to take the first serious step? It is nice and scary, causing keen interest at the same time as well as the feeling of pride that you are so big that can cope with being in the large house alone. You are able and you should care for the people around you. At this time, you seem to stand upright, gain height and self-confidence and realize that you are already an adult.
Sandro Suladze's short feature film "The Watchers" (2021) is about the inexhaustible fantasy, wild imagination, ascetic life and the first steps towards manhood of two young brothers.
The movie begins without any prehistory, the author does not tell any story of the past, does not provide information about the acting characters: Where did they come from? What do they want? Why do they live away from civilization? Where is their mother? We don't know. The director might not have given us this information deliberately in order to focus only on the children's first adventure and make the main story more important with the included facts and themes.
Lasha and Gio’s first "big" adventure begins when a passer-by brings the news – a strange creature is killing cattle in the neighboring village, and calls the boys' father for help. Father leaves, the boys stay alone in a small house away from the village. The theory of "evil spirits" penetrates deep into the children's minds and its definition grows as much as their imaginations. Along with the discovery of witches, it is their duty to take care of each other, look after the house and their own goat – Rosy.
From this event, the boys’ daily life changes radically. The world is more diverse, interesting, tense and magical. Hoping to see something interesting, the children set up a lookout on the roof of the house and relentlessly explore the surroundings. Something might appear, they may see the "enemy" at least this morning, that their vigil will make sense, that they will believe in the diversity of the universe. Reality is too banal, and the evil spirit is too earthly to protect oneself and a stone amulet with figures scratched on it is not necessary. The lost line between reality and imagination will lead to great disappointment and a bitter rift on the ground. It is a difficult but important experience, which is as familiar to everyone as the desire to translate fantasies into reality.
The director reminds us of the first encounter with fear, fighting it, taking bold steps, great disappointment, and adds a bit of fantasy to all of this. The boy's eyes are filled with an incomprehensible brightness and in a moment he learns, understands and believes in the theory of "evil spirits." After receiving the responsibility from his father, he seems to become calmer, more balanced and fearless. The family is a duty to him, where "a witch does not dare" to appear.
Given their ascetic lifestyle, a childish mind needed to invent such a tale. After all, they live alone, away from the village, only with their father, learn to shoot weapons and do not have such a "childish" childhood as their peers. They tried to make up for the loss with this small fact, they trusted and believed their own invented story so deeply that they misperceived the real situation – "What evil spirits are you talking about, it might be just a beast.”
If we follow the trends of modern cinema, where social problems, freedom of expression, class segregation and violation of rights are the main object of interest, and the directors also follow this trend, Sandro Suladze’s short film, from this point of view, develops a completely different direction. In the idea, mythic, dreamlike, fantasy leitmotif films are slowly becoming fewer and cinema is becoming a platform for spreading social messages for directors and non-directors alike. This is already the norm today because the medium of cinema can be used in different ways. Against this background, the existence of such films as even "The Watchers" is necessary.
With this seemingly light, pleasant work, the director deals with a complex topic, which is one of the most important problems for modern times – the collision of the modern and ancient worlds. Capitalism and the world speed development erased the past and turned everything into one big present, destroyed all values, tangible materials. This crazy process of creating the new and destroying the old eliminates all cultural values, sentiments of the past, emotional thinking, which ultimately limits a person's imagination, both existing and unbelievable dreams.
The director of the film is also one of the screenwriters. His artistic decisions and non-standard story are accompanied by an emphasis on visuals. Here the words are more background and do not have the function of a source of information. Children's moving bodies full of enthusiasm and burning eyes seem not needing speech, they are mobilized to catch the witches, and concentration weakens the ability to speak. The fact that there is little speaking in the film increases all the sensations that the children, the nature, the story should evoke. For example, we can cite the last scene – how the disappointed boys meet their father who has returned home. At this time, there is no dialogue and there is no need, everything is already clear to everyone. Silence, a little music and the sounds of nature add more mystique and interest to the unfolding events.
The chronology of the film creates a situation where events should develop quickly and clearly. The director's decision to keep dialogues to a minimum makes this task difficult. This is accompanied by rough assembly cuts. The rapid transition from shot to shot is striking and disturbing. The main function of editing is the management of space and time, the right editing creates a meaningful system of the film, which is slightly violated in "The Watchers" and cuts the viewer's eyes with places of coupling.
Despite the technical flaw, this film with the sentimentality of the content and the beautiful world seen through the eyes of a child is something that captures you, makes you think, remember and smile. That's how cinema can be not only a bearer of pathetic admonitions, wisdom and social messages, but also simply a good story about kindness and happiness.
Eva Gvritishvili
