Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors at The Queen Theatre
- Admission: $10 for general public; free for QFS members
The Queen’s Film Society presents Sergei Parajanov’s Shadows of Our Forgotten (1965) Ancestors in a dazzling 4K restoration on the big screen.
Widely considered the most important film in the history of Ukrainian cinema, Shadows of Our Forgotten Ancestors is a masterwork that boldly combines folkloric pageantry, fairy tale mysticism, and frenetic, hallucinatory cinematography.
Adapted from Mykhailo Kotsiubynsky’s novel, Shadows tells the story of Ivan, a young Hutsul peasant who witnesses his father’s murder by the local miser. Years later, Ivan falls in love with the miser’s daughter, Marichka, but her shocking death leaves him wallowing in grief until he meets Palahna, a beautiful woman who seems to restore his faith in life and hope for the future. When the ghost of Marichka begins to haunt Ivan, however, Palahna is driven into the arms of a local sorcerer, with tragic results.
Filmed with constantly innovative camera movements, in vivid color and featuring a collage-like soundtrack, which brings together Ukrainian folk melodies with modernist, experimental orchestration, it is one of cinema’s singular productions, capturing the spiritual majesty of the past by creatively forging the medium’s future.
