Chris Akins forbidden love story get warm applause in Cannes

The Swedish-Georgian director Levan Akin got the idea to record his latest film in Georgia when he saw the news about the brutal hatattacker against the first Georgian Pride parade a few years ago.

" I saw those images when I was working with the movie ”the Circle” and I just couldn't let them go. I definitely wanted to do something about it, " says Levan Akin in a lush hotel garden on a back street in Cannes.

warm applause for his film ”And then we danced” - a floating free and moving drama from today's Tiblisi. The film, which had its world premiere in Cannes, centers on a young dancer who falls in love with a newcomer in the dance company. The main role is played by Levan Gelbakhiani, Akin found on Instagram, georgians as well as any other in the film.

”And then we danced” Photo: French Quarter Film

Levan Akin began to explore the dance world in the Georgian capital Tblisi and culture of the country the national stage for dance with a focus on traditional Georgian dances. He found the story of the forbidden love story between two young male dancers, and based ago the script on long interviews with the real people.

"It is paradoxical that the world is so homophobic considering it is rather a norm to be gay than an exception in the dance world in the west," says Akin.

He is pleased that someone has already called the film a ”Georgian Dirty Dancing”, a film that is Akin like a lot like the old ”A chorus line”, ”Paris is burning” and new documentaries about dancers who ”Bobbi Jene”.

written in English but translated into Georgian, was he from a series of nyckelscener that the Georgian actors, several dancers in real life, too, was deleted from.

" most directors have a huge need to control, I also, but I really got to go against the impulses here to be able to work much more freely. For example, we used a mobile camera could follow the actors in a 360 degree angle, so that they could improvise, " he says.

the Cooperation with the official Georgian dance world was far from free. Levan Akin did a lot of research and had meetings with the Georgian National Ballet but when a manager was clear as to what the film was about, he got the proposal to tell us about the ”normal” story about heterosexual love instead.

"I was told that there are no gays in the dance world and to traditional Georgian dance was softer 50 years ago but that it now is based on masculinity," says Akin.

the last was a replica that was put in the mouth of the boys ' hårdförare dance teacher in the film. When the state department withdrew from the cooperation he received and the cast and crew either not use some of their premises.

– We also had to have bodyguards during the filming and received threats from extremist groups, " says Akin.