Silk Road House

In the spring of 2011, as many of us should remember, Silk Road House presented [the Daughter-in-Law] (Kazakhfilm, 2009), the first film in the trilogy by Ermek Tursunov (b. 1961), the writer, director (and in the past a well-known sportsman), - the unique Kazakh film, which has no dialogue. Now we're going to see the second film in the trilogy, [the Old Man] (Kazakhfilm, 2012), being shot after Hemingway's novel "The Old Man and the Sea," a survival story as if rewritten for our days in Kazakhstan. "Hemingway à la Kazakh," as Tursunov once labeled it. Only instead of an aging fisherman, a giant marlin, sharks, and the sea, here we have an old Kazakh man, sheep, wolves, and the steppe.

Critics call this film a definite landmark of Kazakh cinematography: they point out its epic scale and the distinctive style that reminds of a deep parable speaking of something that is common and essential to all humankind.

Director - Ermek Tursunov. Writers - Ermek Tursunov and Maulen Ashimbaev. Cinematography - Murat Aliyev. Artistic director - Böpesh Zhandaev. Original music - Kuat Shildebayev. Sound technician and music director - Sergei Lobanov.  First assistant director - Naryn Igilik. Visual effects producer - Damir Ainikeev. Producer - Aleksandr Vovnianko.

Cast: Erbulat Toguzakov, named the best actor of 2012 (in fact, he was just an unskilled laborer at the studio) plays the Old Man and Orynbek Moldakhan plays his grandson, lovingly called by a nickname `Shaitanbek' (lit. `a little devil`).

Running time: 102 min.  In Kazakh with English subtitles.


The screening will take place at SRH on Saturday September 7, at 5pm. It will be introduced and commented on by Alma Kunanbaeva.


Silk Road House, 1944 University Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 (between Milvia & Martin Luther King; enter by side door in passageway under black Zabu Zabu awning); e-mail: silkroadhouse@yahoo.com; website: www.silkroadhouse.org; facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/SilkRoadHouse; tel.: 510-981-0700.


Silk Road House events are sponsored by the Silkroad Foundation.