It’s a long time since I have been so touched by a film as ‘And Then We Danced’. It opened a door to a culture and country I knew nothing about: Georgia. Ironically, it’s a door that most of the characters in the film are trying to leave. The trailer below actually contains an omission in the subtitles – when Mary offers Merab a cigarette, she actually offers him ‘an English cigarette’.
This longing for another world, out of the strict confines of Georgia’s traditions, is a reoccurring theme. Convention verses individual freedom – can you forge a different life for yourself and still honour and celebrate the society in which you live?
A stand out scene: A handheld camera captures Merab’s spontaneous dance as Robyn’s disco track ‘Honey’ plays in the background; a honey coloured light flooding through the slats of the old Georgian house. It’s an exhilarating moment of real surprise and beauty that great cinema can still sometimes produce.
