Shoghakat Vardanyan’s film “1489” has won at an international festival
The film “1489” has won at the Rome International Documentary Film Festival.
During the 44-day Artsakh war, Shoghakat Vardanyan searched for her missing brother, Soghomon, alongside her parents. She documented the entire process. The 3 years of filming are encapsulated in the movie.
On the seventh day of the war, her brother, 21-year-old student and musician Soghomon Vardanyan, went missing. At the time, he was nearing the end of his military service. Shoghakat decided to document her family’s search and their emotional journey. Six months later, bones were discovered, but DNA testing was still required to determine whether they belonged to Soghomon. The results of the DNA identification took another year and a half to arrive.
The title 1489 refers to the number assigned to Soghomon’s remains.
Shoghakat Vardanyan spoke about this film:
I made this film for all the boys who have died… The work on the film was nearly completed when the ethnic cleansing began in Artsakh in September 2023. I have written about what happened in the subtitles. My film tells the story of a human life that takes place during a terrible period in history.
Shoghakat Vardanyan’s 1489 film has received two awards—Best Film and the FIPRESCI prize—at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA). This is an unprecedented achievement in the history of Armenian cinema at film festivals.