Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors (Blu-ray)

A towering achievement of world cinema, Sergei Parajanov’s modernist landmark fuses folkloric traditions, animistic mysticism, and hallucinatory visual invention. Adapted from a 1911 novella by Ukrainian writer Mykhailo Kotsiubynskyi, Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors follows Ivanko (Ivan Mykolaichuk), a young Hutsul peasant who experiences both the depths of grief and glimmers of hope as he attempts to move beyond his first love, Marichka (an ethereal Larysa Kadochnykova). Steeped in the earthy atmosphere of the Carpathian Mountains, and featuring kinetic, radiantly colorful cinematography by Yuri Illienko and a collagelike experimental soundtrack, Parajanov’s film is a singularly mythopoeic work of art.