Dry Leaf

Lisa, a photographer, goes missing while on assignment to photograph rural soccer fields in Georgia. Troubled by her disappearance, her father Irakli embarks on a journey across the country’s vast and varied landscape in hopes of finding her. He’s accompanied by Lisa’s invisible best friend, Levani, and together the two travel from town to town searching for clues.

Shot entirely on an outdated cellphone (an ancient Sony Ericsson, to be precise), Dry Leaf is a radical reimagining of the “road movie” genre. Stunning Georgian scenery—from majestic mountains to idyllic sundrenched farms—is rendered in blurred, pixelated images that challenge our ideas about natural beauty in cinema. Backgrounded by an atmospheric, elegiac score and featuring a subtle, Kiarostami-like wit, the film is a moving, transcendent meditation on family, country, and life on the road written in a cinematic language all its own.