Feature Narratives · India Premiere

Guria

Directed by Levan Koguashvili

Screening at DIFF 2026

Fri30 1:45 PM to 3:43 PMFriday 30 Oct · Hermann Gmeiner Hall

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Runtime: 118 min
Year: 2026
Countries: Bulgaria, Georgia, Luxembourg, Norway, Saudi Arabia, Switzerland, Turkey
Language: Georgian
Subtitles: English
Premiere: India

Synopsis

The Soviet Union has collapsed, but the promised prosperity has not reached Guria, in western Georgia. Electricity flickers between light and darkness, policemen steal trolleybus cables to sell as scrap, and the widower Zuriko, a forty-five-year-old hazelnut farmer, refuses the paltry sums the Italian buyers offer for his harvest. His best friend Gela helps him search for better buyers and introduces him to potential wives, who inevitably fail to satisfy Zuriko’s disapproving ex-mother-in-law. After surviving a highway robbery, Zuriko pursues Maya, the village music teacher. Meanwhile Zuriko’s son Achi suffers his own heartbreak when the girl he loves, Eka, is “kidnapped” and marries his rival, Beso. In Guria, Zuriko’s world shifts constantly between hardship and absurdity, beauty pageants and violence, love and sadness.

Director

Levan KoguashviliLevan Koguashvili was born in Tbilisi, Georgia. He studied at the Georgian State Film Institute before the civil war interrupted his training, during which he worked as a television journalist. He later graduated from VGIK in Moscow under Soviet auteur Marlen Khutsiyev and earned a Master’s from New York University’s…

Cast and crew

Producer: Olena Yershova, Levan Koguashvili, Boris Frumin (Kino Iberica), Pascal Traechslin, Donato Rotunno, Stefan Kitanov, Kanat Doğramacı, Elisa Fernanda Pirir
Writer: Boris Frumin, with Levan Koguashvili and Georgi Kekelidze
Cinematographer: Gigi Samsonadze, Giorgi Shvelidze
Editor: Pia Dumont
Sound: Patrick Becker, Vano Gvaradze, Oswald Schwander
Music: Giorgi Gordeladze
Cast: Kakhaber Tcholadze, Natia Nikolaishvili, Vamekh Jangidze, Davit Natsvaladze, Anamaria Kamladze, Sergi Kviloria