Aurora's Sunrise
Year
2022
Duration
96 min.
About the Film
At only 14 years old, Aurora lost everything during the horror of the Armenian genocide. Two years later, through luck and extraordinary courage, she escaped to New York, where her story became a media sensation. Starring as herself in Auction of Souls, an early Hollywood blockbuster, Aurora became the face of one of the largest charity campaigns in American history. With a blend of vivid animation, interviews with Aurora herself, and 18 minutes of surviving footage from her lost silent epic, Aurora's Sunrise revives a forgotten story of survival.
Film's trailer:
Aurora's Sunrise is the first-ever animated feature created by Bars Media, and the first-ever animated documentary film made in Armenia — and making the film was no simple task.
Five years into the making of Aurora’s Sunrise production of the film hit a major obstacle. In September 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic was in full swing — which had already put production, especially animation into a precarious position — a new conflict erupted over the landlocked region of Nagorno-Karabakh.
During the 44 day war, all of the men on Bars Media’s staff were on the front lines, some under direct fire. The strain of the war put the entire project in jeopardy, and the studio itself nearly shut down. But thanks to the perseverance of the German and Lithuanian co-producers the project kept moving forward.
FESTIVALS (+ many more)
Annecy International Animation Film Festival 2022, France
Feature Films Contrechamp Competition
World Premiere
Asia Pacific Screen Awards 2022, Australia
Winner Best Animated Film
Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2022, Estonia
Award for Best Baltic Producer for Co-production
IDFA 2022, Netherlands
Audience Favorites
Golden Apricot Yerevan International Film Festival 2022, Armenia
Winner Silver Apricot in International Competition
Animation is Film Festival 2022, USA
Winner Audience Award
Asian World Film Festival 2022, USA
Winner Audience Award
Europa! Europa Film Festival 2023, Australia
Winner Audience Award
MiradasDoc 2023, Spain
Best Feature Length Documentary Award
FIFDH- 21st International Film Festival and Forum on Human Rights 2023, Switzerland,
Grand Prix de Geneve Winner
Movies that Matter Festival 2023, Netherlands
Audience Award Winner & Special Mention Winner in Camera Justitia award
Atlantida Mallorca Film Festival 2023, Spain
Winner ACEC Critics Award
Shine Global - Children’s Resilience in Film Awards 2023
Nominee Feature Film
Festival of Cinema NYC, 2023
Nominee Best Feature Narrative
15th DMZ International Documentary Film Festival, 2023, Korea
Korean Premier, Verite section
Cartagena de Indias International Film Festival 2023, Columbia, Kaleidoscope section
Hong Kong International Film Festival 2023, Hong Kong
Thessaloniki Documentary Film, 2023, Greece, Open Horizons section
It's All True International Documentary Film Festival, 2023, Brazil
International Competition of Feature and Medium-Length Documentaries
Director and her vision of the Film
Inna Sahakyan
Inna Sahakyan has directed and produced feature-length documentaries, documentary series, and shorts, for over fifteen years. Following her feature-length debut co-directing
the award-winning Armenia’s Last Tightrope Dancer in 2010, she directed Mel and Aurora’s Sunrise, completing both international co-productions in 2022. Inna also enjoys mentoring her native Armenia’s next generation of filmmakers.
My mission was to create a film taking audiences beyond the cold facts of the genocide, so I decided on a dynamic combination of mediums: animation, archival interviews with Aurora Mardiganian, and digitally-restored footage from Aurora’s 1919 film Auction of Souls.
I believe this film is important because in Aurora Mardiganian’s story we see a brave young Armenian woman who, despite enduring genocide, hunger, slavery, and
exploitation, refused to be a victim. She refused to be swept away by the tides of history.
It’s a timeless story of the resilience of the human spirit, the power of hope, and the importance of never giving up. In our evermore uncertain world, this kind of story should be told.