YEREVAN, JULY 8, ARMENPRESS. Armenian President Armen Sarkissian has attended the grand opening of the 15th International Golden Apricot Yerevan Film Festival, Sarkissian’s office said.

Golden Apricot Yerevan International Film Festival was founded in 2004. The film festival was called so as the apricot symbolizes Armenia, it is indispensable part of Armenia: a Latin name of an apricot is “prunus аrmeniaсa” that means “the Armenian plum” and the warm colour of apricot is found in Armenian national flag.

Nevertheless, the festival was not born casually. Armenian cinema since the independence in 1991, though shy, but break through the international festivals. The Armenian cinema has caused big resonance of festivals and retrospective shows in Paris (Pompidou's Center, 1993), in Montreal (2000), in Bologna (2003), and etc. The international success accompanied to the new films of Harutyun Khachatryan, Suren Babayan, Vigen Chaldranyan, David Safaryan, Narine and Arsen Mkrtchyan, Edgar Bagdasaryan, and other Armenian film-makers. It became obvious that in Armenia, country with the settled tradition of film production (the first film studio was founded in Armenia in 1923, and the first feature film “Namus” by Beknazarian was screened in 1925), country, in which the cinematograph is connected to the names of Sergey Parajanov and Artavazd Peleshian, needed its own International film festival, which it hasn’t had before.

The Golden Apricot festival is different from other such events in the sense that it is smaller scale and more intimate, but it continues to garner international attention and respect. The films are presented in two international competition sections: features and documentaries. One Grand Prize Golden Apricot and one Special Mention (Silver Apricot) are awarded in each category. The festival has a special pan-Armenian competitive section - Armenian Panorama - for films produced by filmmakers of Armenian descent. 

Edited and translated by Stepan Kocharyan