Netherlands

Documentary

Through a collage of personal archive footage and photographs, the history emerges of a small, metaphorical city where all the streets are named after poets. The town’s psychogeography defines the mental and emotional state of its inhabitants, who live in a utopian illusion founded on poetry.
When the system changes, and war begins, new neighbourhoods emerge to accommodate the refugees, and the existing street names are replaced by new ones. Abrupt and sweeping upheavals lead to confusion among the city’s residents, who soon find themselves lost amid the memories of the forgotten poets.

Written & directed by: Sara Rajaei
Produced by: Manon Bovenkerk
Editing: Nathalie Alonso Casale
Original Score: Milan Gataric
Sound: Hugo Dijkstal

Statement of the director:
The idea for CITY OF POETS started with a mulberry tree, planted by my grandmother in the garden of her house. The tree was almost as old as me. It was a rare tree as it had both red and white berries. That tree presented me with domesticity, happiness, belonging, and a sense of wisdom. My grandmother had a strong connection to it, too; she always talked to it, sang to it and danced in front of it. Once the tree was gone, it felt as if she had died again.
The absence of the tree brought me to my memories of my grandmother’s house and how it was the first shelter for my family after becoming refugees of war. Then my mind moved to the alley where the house was located, and then I thought of the city, where all the streets were named after poets. As a four-year-old, I knew many poets’ names.
It was a complex process of remembering. But once I began writing the voice over, the order of things changed. I wrote about a fictional city where all the streets were named after poets. And then, with every change in society, the street names were replaced by new ones. In a way, these changes gradually mapped the history of that city from the inside. From there, I moved to one specific alley, a specific house, ending with the mulberry tree.
CITY OF POETS is a chain of images, just like the daisy chain of memories I based the story on. Each frame gives birth to the next and motivates another image to appear. I have composed the structural transition of the city through fragmentary memories that are told by the voice-over, addressing the most essential aspect of oral history: as something that is not fixed and made up of different sources and voices, without specific hierarchy, repeated and changed ever so slightly. In CITY OF POETS, the town’s psychogeography defines the mental and emotional state of its inhabitants, a small group of people living in a utopian illusion founded on poetry. And because the place is not named, the changes and confusion can trigger personal stories and memories in the viewer.

Production:
near/by film
https://nearbyfilm.com

World Sales:
Gargantua Film Distribution
https://www.gargantuafilm.it/