A gorgeous portrait of a photographer coming into her own by Moscow-based filmmaker Evgenii Bakirov. While the work of Aleksandra Kirievskaya may exude strength and self-assurance, Kirievskaya didn’t always feel this way herself. In fact, when Bakirov and Kirievskaya first met through a series of short interviews, he learned that she used to be extremely reserved — only taking pictures of close friends and family. It wasn’t until Kirievskaya realized the limitations this placed on her career prospects that she was finally able to push herself to do what needed to be done. As Bakirov explains further:
“When I saw Sasha’s works for the first time, I immediately had an urge to make a slideshow of them and watch it with music… The story which is told in the film is a collective image of my thoughts as a film director, the thoughts of several close people of Sasha and of course the thoughts of Sasha herself. When all the collected material lay on the paper, it was decided not to use many different voiceovers, but to take only one narrator — an imaginary friend of Sasha, who knows everything about her. So, in some way, the storyteller is a person who knows Sasha even better than her family. The music in the final of the film marks the end of this personal history of overcoming. We wanted this music to be sung as if by everyone Sasha had ever photographed. We imagined all the creators of this film and all its viewers singing in this chorus.”
Written & Directed by Evgenii Bakirov
Director of Photography: Dmitriy Sukhov & Evgenii Bakirov
Music: Jora Vensky
Sound Design: Vladislav Kotov & Jora Vensky
Color Grading: Artem Leonov
This video was submitted by Evgenii Bakirov and selected by our team. Click here if you have a project you’d like us to check out!
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