Could be it if we are not humane?
I have been regularly teaching young writers the key components of storytelling over the last three years. I assist them in finding answers to questions such as “What is an interesting story? How is a story set? What needs to make the story curious?” and perfecting story ideas growing in their minds.
One of my initial questions addressed is associated with their expectations for their own works. We move forward on the storytelling aligned with the goals they set. The most important questions given by young writers is: How can we ensure that our tale becomes difficult, is not perceived as a personal matter, and does not appear to be a narrative drowned in the midst of ordinary domestic affairs? Even some express that they want their stories be humane, universal. These are, in general, the most highly ambitious and innocent intentions.
My next question is something like this: Indeed, do you want to be humane? For instance, your objective is to have your protagonist act in the background of global geopolitical events rather than a city or nation, and to set your story, correct? Should the protagonist’s microenvironment be triggered by the influence of the global event and rely only on the world-scaled (macro environmental) event? Perhaps, we should be content with the cities or nation where the protagonist resides. After all, when our protagonist’s conflict is associated with a larger issue impacting the city or country, it will move beyond personality and personal issues…
They frequently ask for samples. To make sure that the goal doesn’t feel inaccessible or far away, I want to cite the plots as a reference from the local works. I provide examples of stories of the novels written and films shot during the Soviet-era. During that time, a bulk of authors and scriptwriters were graduates of the faculty of philology or the Maxim Gorky Literature Institute in Moscow and naturally they apprehended the accurate principles of traditional storytelling at these education centres. They would have learnt the proper principles traditional storytelling at these educational establishments. Accordingly, even though market-oriented, conjectural novels, scenarios were poor and miserable in substance, it was skillfully handled from the storytelling perspective.
In recent times, one of my favorite movies I enthusiastically gave sample is “The Kiosk” consisting of five episodes directed by Mirsadig Aghazade. In this article the television series version of the aforementioned film “the Kiosk” is referred. I was astonished while watching the film. In spite of filming by using artisanal (handmade) techniques, its plot was quietly original. Above all, the macro-environment influences the micro-environment; in other words, a nationwide event directly impacts the protagonist’s life, and highlights the most significant deficit in our modern national film. In fact, the story of the film’s protagonist begins with the national event. Amidst the fighting during the First Nagorno-Karabakh War, Gafar (played by Sanan Allaz), the main protagonist of the film, was born inside the vehicle known as a “shop vehicle or van shop” in Soviet times.
The “shop vehicle” – a mobile kiosk – will catalyze the central story of the film and become the main symbol of the play. Gafar’s mother dies after his birth. After a while, he loses his father. During his father’s lifetime, he teaches the art of carving. Initially, his father, then young Gafar decorates the kiosk with the carving and cutting crafts, which were used for both living and trading purposes.
The businessman (Kamran Shamardan), selling kiosks to Georgia, casts his eyes on Gafar’s kiosk. The protagonist rejects to sell this cherished family property, a keepsake from his parents which serves as his house. But consequently, he mixes up the kiosk, where he spends the night, with the nearby kiosk on sale and loads onto train and transports to Georgia. Even though Gafar opens his eyes inside his own kiosk, soon he finds himself in another country. When he sees the police, he flees and attempts to find a solution.
From that point onwards, mobile street trading is prohibited. Mobile traders and human rights activists protest the law and hold a rally. Georgia’s commitments to Europe are frequently reminded to the authorities and demanded to restore mobile street trading. Gafar, searching for his own kiosk and attempting to return to his home country after discovering the documents, becomes caught in the country’s current political process—fervent protests calling for the restoration of mobile street trade.
The second protagonist of the film, Leila (Nino Iashvili) who makes a living by selling flower, has fled from Abkhazia as a refugee. She has lost her house and family at the war. Their shared misery past of lost causes them to feel each other more deeply. The young couple’s romantic relationship begins.
What makes this film unique as an education manual for me?
One of modest Soviet poets writes poem that romanticizes the green grass in his mother’s yard, his calf and his rural life. Then he takes his poem to his friend, a composer for asking to make musical composition. The composer with wide mindset says his friend: “I understand the romance of rural life; a mother, a calf, and some grass are exactly what our country requires. However, this year commemorates twentieth anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s spaceflight. In this period, it is impossible to draw someone’s attention to calf and grass. Take this poem and bring the space-linked version of it to me. Then I will compose.”
The poet returns home and portrays the green grass in his poem from the view of cosmonauts longing for their motherland while orbiting in space. One of the most memorable cosmic hits of the 1980s—the song “Grass by the Home (Трaва у дома)” became the anthem of Soviet astronauts.
Let’s step away the abovementioned individual incidents of that era and concentrate on the wide-scale issues.
In the Soviet era, the presence of the political directive in the arts –in those notable fields more popular among the masses was critical, particularly in popular sectors like as music, literature and cinema. It was, even, almost indispensable. This is because the political system of the time considered it essential for diverse, multiethnic subordinates to one central power to have similar ethical norms, shared values, and moral standards. To govern these masses successfully, there existed values and norms which were necessary to infuse them: Codes of conduct in private life, literacy, diligence, patriotism, political awareness against “the aggressive policy of the West and other capitalist elements” hatred of alienated elements, the holiness of the family and engagement in production and so on.
Popular genres of art required for the political system to propagate these values to all commons from intellectuals to housekeepers. Since radio, television, and books had invaded in every house. These books, radio and television programs were meant to instill the values need for political system in Soviet citizens. Otherwise, what use would a television, book be in the home of Soviet worker and intellectual? Otherwise, what purpose would a television or a book serve at a Soviet worker and intellectual’s house?
The Soviet authors, film directors, composers should write plays, shoot movies, composer songs which romanticizing diligence, family and motherland. At the same time, the lifestyles of petty bourgeois types, unemployed residents, and unfaithful people in literature and films are heavily criticized. Their moral degradation is framed within a context of derision. The despicable, oppressed, spiritually decayed character of the individuals’ apathetic attitude to work, family and country were imparted to the Soviet people.
Let us now focus our discussion on cinematic examples and connect the issue to cinema. Films such as “Ulduz”, “Date”, “Great Support”, “Aygun”, “Her Big Heart” and dozens of others can be considered as samples of the policy mentioned above. In these and comparable works, hard effort and a love of labor are unquestionably depicted as the most vital aspects of human life. Characters, which have no enthusiasm for work and inclines towards amusement and leisure, are repeatedly represented as vagrants, petty bourgeois types and undesirable elements of society.
In general, all screen works of romantic-ideological films, such as Babek and Nesimi, to light comedy films, like Where is Ahmad?, had the same ethical and moral norms, which they were meant to impart to the local audience.
At this point in the article, it is clear what conclusion forms in our minds. Censorship, conjuncture, character clichés – what is good about these? Thus, we have done a great job by departing from Soviet film’s traditions, granted authors freedom to create and liberated cinema from being a political tool.
Yes. But…
The issue is not more complex than it seems. The point is that: the Soviet system which compelled the cinema (literature as well) to be transformed to a part of the policy could unintentionally (who knows, maybe intentionally) teach authors, screenwriters, film directors one of the important components of storytelling and as our artists nowadays express, they succeeded in transforming it into their “skills” (competencies). The skill of evading from personality to individuality in storytelling…
To integrate the individual’s problems, grieves and concerns into part of the problems of the society they live, to change the individual’s conflict to part of conflict of the society, and to bring individual’s destiny into a state of the fate of the society are among the vital components in storytelling. It is just the chain of events arising from the microenvironment-macroenvironment interaction (sometimes one-sided, sometimes reciprocal interaction) that expands the scope of the problem set in the story. By doing this, personal, commonplace, and petty worries are removed…
It is not necessary for a story to be humane, but it to avoid individuality is prominent. The previously mentioned film “the Kiosk” is a unique screen work precisely in the sense of avoiding individuality. It is one of the best responses to the questions of how to relate a personal event with the societal and communal one.
Our contemporary film directors, who are incapable of extending the story beyond the protagonist’s spiritual world, emotions, most likely his neighborhood, fail to transform the individual’s problem into a part of some social, public, or cultural process on a nationwide scale. They may effortlessly follow this technique applied in the film “the Kiosk”.
Gunel Movlud