‘Tevanik,’ Karabagh War Film, Travels the US with Director Avetisyan

Avetisyan worries that “Nobody talks about Karabagh anywhere in the street. When people talk about Karabagh and the Armenian Genocide in the street the way they do about the Holocaust, then at that time everything will become okay. We must reach that point.” He believes that “Film can affect people. Furthermore, political leaders are also people, and they have families too.”

Avetisyan feels that the Karabagh war was forced on the Armenians, and the latter’s victory has led to a certain degree of mythologization. He declared: “People have already forgotten what war is, and the bad things that are connected to it. I am a proponent of peace. Its value will become more apparent if we continually talk about the price of war. We will thus keep war at a distance from Karabagh.”

Though at present he works as the chief director of Yerkir Media in Yerevan, preparing television documentaries as well as films, he said that “artistic films are his love.” One such film can take three to four years to make for him. His forthcoming film probably will take around 30 months. Avetisyan said, “And you have to continually work on it. A film is more jealous than a jealous woman.”

He finds the challenges of his work different from that of the Soviet period. He said, “I learned from the masters who were the cinematographers of the Soviet Union. Now we have freedom, but no money. Then there was time and money.”

Avetisyan’s oeuvre consists of 14 documentaries and seven films. Most of his important previous work has focused on Karabagh. His prior film, “Broken Childhood,” relates a true story about an Azerbaijani attack, supported by Russian troops, on the Armenian village of Maragha. It tells the story of a six-year-old girl who is taken captive and held by an Azerbaijani woman who hoped, in vain as it turns out, to exchange her own captive child for this Armenian. Avetisyan also has made a documentary called “Gharabagh: Taknvats Gandz” [Gharabagh: Hidden Treasure].

The script for “Tevanik” was initially written by Arnold Aghababov in 1996-1997. Years after he passed away, Karine Khodikyan expanded it to feature-film length. Armenia’s National Cinema Center in part financed the film, and individuals also helped through Avetisyan’s Fish Eye Art cultural foundation. The president of the Nagorno Karabagh Republic, Bako Sahakyan, and the NKR government greatly facilitated the making of the film. The Karabagh army made all the war scenes possible, he added.

“Tevanik” premiered at the Moscow Cinema in Yerevan in May 2014 and in Artsakh in June, and has been shown in various European cities. It has won a considerable number of awards, including: Best Screenplay at the Los Angeles Arpa International Film Festival in November 2014; Best Feature Prize in the Armenian Panorama Competition at the Golden Apricot Film Festival in July 2014; Audience Favorite Award at the Silk Road International Film Festival in Xi’an, China in 2014; and Most Original Work in the International Feature Films Competition of the Overlook 2014 Film Festival in Rome. It was also shown at the 67^th Cannes Film Festival.

Avetisyan pointed out that the importance of having such a film shown internationally was well understood by politicians and states. The Azerbaijani government sent a letter of protest to the Lithuanian government about the participation of Artbox, a Lithuanian company, in the production of this film.

Arick Gevorkian, who coordinated the film’s tour through the US and supported Avetisyan’s work, was introduced by Ashjian after the film’s showing to speak further about the importance of films like “Tevanik,” as well as the financial difficulties involved in filmmaking in Armenia and Karabagh. Ashjian admiringly declared about Gevorkian that “He is a one-man show. He is a businessman, a lecturer, and an event coordinator.”

Gevorkian declared that the financial cost of making “Tevanik” was $176,000, but if the assistance of the NKR government were to be monetized, the total cost would have been roughly half a million dollars. While this may be a trifling sum compared to Hollywood budgets, it is extremely difficult to raise in Armenia. Yet with this small sum, a film was produced that, according to film critic Carlos Aguilar, was a contender in the 2015 Academy Awards. The problem is that Avetisyan and his team did not have enough money to market the film appropriately.

Avetisyan wants to do things differently with his new film. Called “The Last Inhabitant,” it is about the collapse of the Soviet Union, Sumgait, the Karabagh conflict and related events. Its trailer was shown to the Boston audience. Several internationally famous actors have agreed to participate in it at greatly reduced rates of compensation. It will be filmed in the summer of 2015, with an approximate cost of $250,000. Avetisyan still is in debt for $95,000 of this total. The US tour of “Tevanik” was intended to raise money for this new film.

Gevorkian said, “Film art is the only way for us to make our voice heard in the world. Our enemy works to make sure we cannot make these films. If we cannot raise some $40-50,000 now in five or six communities in the US, let us not talk about the Armenian Cause. There are no corporations helping us. We are raising $500 here, $1,000 there.”

The Hyasa Center (hyasa.org), a nonprofit organization in Los Angeles, is the US vehicle for fundraising for the film. Gevorkian is the head of its entertainment division. In Armenia, Avetisyan has an organization called Fish Eye Arts which also does fundraising.