Taming the Garden

An influential man, former Prime Minister of Georgia, has a special kind of hobby. He buys and collects ancient trees and plants them on the coastline, in his private garden and some of them reach as high as a 16-story building. Needless to say, the complexity involved by the process of uprooting and transporting them is only matched by their magnificence: other trees need to be cut down, electrical cables need to be moved, and new pathways need to be created through the tangerine orchards. Through exploring man’s relationship with the environment and that of a community with such a tree which marks its existence and which, at some point, disappears, the film approaches the ethics of environmental protection in a subtle manner, without excesses and ostentatiousness, even though uprooting, a theme we have become accustomed to metaphorically, takes an oppressive and tangible form. The rhythm of the action is in perfect accord with that of nature: dignified, calm and measured, since control doesn’t lie in the hands of the many anyway. This is at the same time a poetical and political film, one with a powerful discourse, which examines a multitude of social-political and psychological layers, all the while preserving a meditative atmosphere, which is probably the most conducive for living the experience of nature. (Sorana Stănescu)