A ROOM OF MY OWN – REVIEW

By MARTIN FABINYI

Ioseb “Soso” Bliadze’s haunting film, A Room Of My Own, set in Tbilisi during the dark days of the Covid plague, brings Tina (Taki Mumladze, also the film’s co-writer) to the door of party girl Megi (Mariam Khundadze) for a short stay while waiting for her boyfriend to come and rescue her.

Neither one knows the other, and slowly, over the course of this small and delicately told story, they move from enemies to friends, sharing loss, rejected love and sexual exploration.

Tina has a past which has torn her from her family and her studies, and Megi, saving to leave Georgia for New York as soon as she can, has a strange tendency to faint whenever she becomes stressed (which is at first terrifying for Tina)

When Tina’s boyfriend finally arrives, he breaks up with her, and she is forced to return to Megi’s flat and her tiny room. Megi introduces her to excessive drinking sprees and dope parties, leading to a sexual experience between the girls that is played out, like the pandemic, in a casual dimension.

Taki Mumladze has said that she felt safe with the scene as she trusted her male director, (unusual for such a female-led story) and hoped that there could be more sexual freedoms in Georgia, where, although being gay has been legal since 2000, it is taboo in large parts of the country.

There is a clarity to the storytelling and the laying bare of secrets which evolved from a short film written by Taki and Ioseb. Between them they decided to expand this into a feature script which was, in the words of Ioseb Bliadze, “a seven month shoot made possible by friends and friendship”.

Taki has said “It was very difficult to bring this character into reality. I knew that she should be an introvert and that she should not lose her emotions. During the shoot I lived the life of this character. Tina with her skin, energy and everything is a very real person to me.”

The film’s force is drawn from the remarkable performances of Taki Mumladze and Mariam Khundadze. Their relationship is beautifully played out, and each of these actors will no doubt springboard to a wider acting career from the international critical response to the film, which premiered at the London Film Festival in 2022. It has its Australian premiere at the Inner West Film Festival.

For director Ioseb “Soso” Bliadze, who had already found success with Otar’s Death in 2021, his future career will be watched by critics and audiences alike.

★★★★★

April 1, 2:15pm

Palace Norton, 99 Norton St, Leichhardt

www.innerwest.nsw.gov.au