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Endless Corridor film to be broadcast on Eurochannel

09 December 2015 15:01 (UTC +04:00)

As website reads Directed by Aleksandras Brokas and Mindaugas Urbonavicius, and narrated by British cinema legend Jeremy Irons, Endless Corridor follows Lithuanian journalist Richard Lapaitis on a trip back to Azerbaijan 20 years after he covered the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and the Khojaly massacre as a war correspondent; a story, he says, that has haunted him since, The European Azerbaijani Society (TEAS) told APA.

“The tragedy of Khojaly tells the story of how cynical and inhuman people decided over the destiny of others,” said director Aleksandras Brokas talking about the film.

Film was premiered in London at the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) last year on 1 July, with attendance of Mrs. Leyla Aliyeva, Vice-President of the Heydar Aliyev Foundation.

Through heart-rending stories, the survivors recall their escape from the Armenian bombardment, losing many loved ones along an “Endless Corridor” as they sought safety.

Endless Corridor has been praised by international critics, and has received, among other accolades, the main prize of the American edition of the Accolade Global Film Competition, also called the Little Oscars.

Within the JFK campaign framework Endless Corridor was presented in February of this year in Istanbul, Ankara, Rome, Vilnüs, London, Paris, Dublin, Berlin, Bern and Luksembourg. Film originally made in English was translated into Azerbaijani, Turkish, French, Italian, German with subtitles and dubbed into Russian with the initiative by Mrs Leyla Aliyeva.

Also, within JFK campaign framwork the film was broadcast in Kanal 24”, “CNN Türk” of Turkey, Albanian National TV and Israeli “Channel 1”.

Also, an interview with Aleksandras Brokas, Director of the film is published on Eurochannel website: http://www.eurochannel.com/en/Interview-with-Aleksandras-Brokas.html#sthash.vK9xhy1i.dpuf

- Being Lithuanian, why did you decide to make a documentary about a tragedy in Azerbaijan?

- History of many post-Soviet countries are very similar. Lithuania and other Baltic states were only one step away of this kind of tragedy. In the beginning of the 1990s, the Soviet Union incited conflicts between different ethnic groups as the only way to keep control on our countries. Many of those stories have been carefully hidden until our days, and only now, after more than 20 years of independence, they can finally be told.

- The ones who were heroes for a side were assassins for the other one, how did the documentary manages to put an impartial message across not taking sides?

- We were not making any judgement on situation. We invited international war journalists and film professionals from more than 15 countries from all over the world to take a part in our project. Also for the first time in 20 years both sides of conflict had possibilities to tell their stories. Our mission was to collect facts about tragic event and to leave as much space for audience impression.

- What did strike you the most when doing the interviews with victims and listening to their stories?

- It’s always difficult to listen to war stories as they are very sad. It didn’t matter which side of the conflict you were listening to. There were no winners in the war. Each conflict makes harm for many future generations.

- How did you get Jeremy Irons to narrate the documentary, was he interested in the project since its conception?

- Jeremy Irons decided to take a part on our project when documentary was almost finished. I believe that his motivation to narrate Endless Corridor was inspired by a story about the tragedy of human destiny.

- Did you expect the documentary to be as successful as it was in the international circuit?

- When we started the project in early begging we understood that this very sensitive tragic story was going to be recognized by an international audience only if documentary was told from both sides of the conflict. That was one of our main aims. Only during this year Endless Corridor has been nominated more than ten times for Best Documentary, Best Director, Best Editing and Best Producer in a series of different international film festivals and already received five prestigious awards.

- Is there any other conflict or tragedy you would like to make another documentary?

In my future movies I would like to talk more about the ability to live in peace and dignity.

- Are you working on any filming projects at the moment? Can you tell our viewers something about them?

- At the moment we are working on couple of projects. One of them is about human minds and the ability of it to control the reality that surrounds us in our daily life, and how human lives become better after recognizing that nothing happens by chance.