- Occupation
Director - Country
Latvia, Lithuania
Stonys Audrius
Ramin
Ramin Lomsadze, a 75-year-old Georgian wrestler who once won seven matches in 55 seconds, is getting ready for the fight with his last and most formidable opponent - loneliness. He gets on the train and sets off for a remote Georgian village to seek out the girl he loved and lost fifty years ago.
Uku Ukai
"Sorrow does not come merely from contemplating death, which forces us to look into Eternity, but also from life, which compels us to confront Time", wrote Russian philosopher Nikolai Berdyayev. Renowned Lithuanian documentarist Audrius Stonys took these words as a motto for his latest film, a meditative visual essay which portrays old people undertaking all kinds of activities, meditation and group laughter therapy. Without a single word of commentary, he creates from sophisticated, aesthetic images a compelling study of human corporeality which, in an ideal union with spiritual equilibrium, can sustain us with the pledge that old age doesn't have to be a painful wait for the last breath.
The Bell
There is a story of a drowned bell, lying for several hundred years on the bottomof one Lithuanian lake. During the war with Sweden, cart loaded with the bell wascrossing the bridge, it was hit by a cannon-ball and sank. Hit by a cannon-ball during the war with Sweden, a cart with the bell sank in the lake after falling fromthe bridge. The underwater expedition tries to find the bell and buoy it up fromthe bottom of the lake. The Film records exhaustive work, despair and joy insidethe team going under water closer to the legend, covered by sand. Maybe it is justa legend. Maybe there is no bell in the lake. Maybe it is just a fairy tale, an echoe of some lost civilization.
Four Steps
The film is about the metamorphosis of wedding traditions. What has happened to the old wedding traditions that were marked by joy, mystery and sadness? Can we still see the vestiges of these traditions in modern commercialized weddings? Should we be seeking to bring them back? What have we lost? And what have we discovered?
Flight over Lithuania or 510 Seconds of Silence
The film features an incredibly low angel's flight over the dunes of Nida, Trakai castle, the lakes of Aukštaitija (Highlands), the roofs of the Old Town of Vilnius and the fantastically beautiful church steeples. It's like a mystical gliding just above the treetops, meadows covered by early morning mist, as well as the narrow streets of Vilnius. "Flight over Lithuania" was made for the international exhibition EXPO 2000 in Hanover, Germany.
Countdown
Portrait of Augustinas Baltrušaitis, film and theatre director, as well as actor, who fell into obscurity and has now been relegated to the margins of society, as a result of specific political circumstances. Countdown is a film about the limits of memory, the effects of the implacable passage of time, and a hope that surpasses time.
Alone
A sad child is going to pay a visit to her mother in prison. Her solitude is immense. Sitting in the backseat, she looks on in silence outside the window while the landscape passes in front of her eyes. The close up of this silent child is enough to fill the scene with feeling, expectance and timidity
Fedia. Trys minutės po didžiojo sprogimo
Fedia – man living in little yellow house next to Gariūnai marketplace. To him life seems simple, completely transparent and without any hidden truths. Cosmic problems are far away from him. Next to him is world, where lives astrophysics manipulating with numbers, which are so big that do not have names. These two worlds exist next to each other.
Harbour
Time and space have a different meaning here. People go naked, just like they were born, lacking any insignia of rank, position or importance in society. They observe strange rituals, voluntarily subjecting themselves to torture, and trying to wash off the dust of their lives.
Flying over Blue Field
A man sits alone in a plane built at home, and keeps his balance between life and death. During his flight, immense landscapes pass by, half-deserted streets. Silence and waiting are all around. A film about solitude in the endless sky. Part poetry, silence and meditation.
Antigravitation
An isolated village in the Lithuanian countryside. Seated in her house, an elderly woman recites an old folk story. Then she climbs up the tall ladder that takes her to the rooftop of the church. Through her eyes we see the whole village from up high, immense, that is changing with the changing of the seasons. How does the world appear from such an altitude?
Apostle of ruins
The film depicts a Georgian, thrown of to Lithuania, his loneliness and longing for the lost homeland. An attempt to give a meaning to his existence in ruins of things and time.
Earth of the Blind
The film springs from at least three ideas connected to each other in an irrational way: the story of a cow being taken to the butcher, the description of simple pleasures, how to ascend to the top of a hill and descend in a wheelbarrow, and the portraiture of a several blind people. The great, big eyes of the cows are seen in contrast to the unseeing eyes of the blind people.
Baltic Way
A film about the Baltic Way, the event that shook the empire. Baltic Way was a peaceful political demonstration that occurred on August 23, 1989. Approximately two million people joined their hands to form a human chain spanning over 600 kilometres across the three Baltic states.
Open the door to him who comes
A filmmaker encounters a priest who is full of faith and optimism for the future, notwithstanding the hard times of poverty and indifference. The film is completely focused on the observation of affairs and people, of listening to the sounds that help to create another dimension of extraordinary depth. The accounts that father Stanislovas tells join with many images of those who cross the path of the Stonys cinema, and leave a lasting impression.
I Walked Through Fire, You Were With Me
The latest film by renowned Lithuanian filmmaker Audrius Stonys relates the story of Mr. Kriauleidziai and his wife, who lost the roof over their heads after fire engulfed their home. The film also demonstrates man’s ability to come to terms with misfortune, not to lose heart, but to start afresh.
Ramin Lomsadze, a 75-year-old Georgian wrestler who once won seven matches in 55 seconds, is getting ready for the fight with his last and most formidable opponent - loneliness. He gets on the train and sets off for a remote Georgian village to seek out the girl he loved and lost fifty years ago.
Uku Ukai
"Sorrow does not come merely from contemplating death, which forces us to look into Eternity, but also from life, which compels us to confront Time", wrote Russian philosopher Nikolai Berdyayev. Renowned Lithuanian documentarist Audrius Stonys took these words as a motto for his latest film, a meditative visual essay which portrays old people undertaking all kinds of activities, meditation and group laughter therapy. Without a single word of commentary, he creates from sophisticated, aesthetic images a compelling study of human corporeality which, in an ideal union with spiritual equilibrium, can sustain us with the pledge that old age doesn't have to be a painful wait for the last breath.
The Bell
There is a story of a drowned bell, lying for several hundred years on the bottomof one Lithuanian lake. During the war with Sweden, cart loaded with the bell wascrossing the bridge, it was hit by a cannon-ball and sank. Hit by a cannon-ball during the war with Sweden, a cart with the bell sank in the lake after falling fromthe bridge. The underwater expedition tries to find the bell and buoy it up fromthe bottom of the lake. The Film records exhaustive work, despair and joy insidethe team going under water closer to the legend, covered by sand. Maybe it is justa legend. Maybe there is no bell in the lake. Maybe it is just a fairy tale, an echoe of some lost civilization.
Four Steps
The film is about the metamorphosis of wedding traditions. What has happened to the old wedding traditions that were marked by joy, mystery and sadness? Can we still see the vestiges of these traditions in modern commercialized weddings? Should we be seeking to bring them back? What have we lost? And what have we discovered?
Flight over Lithuania or 510 Seconds of Silence
The film features an incredibly low angel's flight over the dunes of Nida, Trakai castle, the lakes of Aukštaitija (Highlands), the roofs of the Old Town of Vilnius and the fantastically beautiful church steeples. It's like a mystical gliding just above the treetops, meadows covered by early morning mist, as well as the narrow streets of Vilnius. "Flight over Lithuania" was made for the international exhibition EXPO 2000 in Hanover, Germany.
Countdown
Portrait of Augustinas Baltrušaitis, film and theatre director, as well as actor, who fell into obscurity and has now been relegated to the margins of society, as a result of specific political circumstances. Countdown is a film about the limits of memory, the effects of the implacable passage of time, and a hope that surpasses time.
Alone
A sad child is going to pay a visit to her mother in prison. Her solitude is immense. Sitting in the backseat, she looks on in silence outside the window while the landscape passes in front of her eyes. The close up of this silent child is enough to fill the scene with feeling, expectance and timidity
Fedia. Trys minutės po didžiojo sprogimo
Fedia – man living in little yellow house next to Gariūnai marketplace. To him life seems simple, completely transparent and without any hidden truths. Cosmic problems are far away from him. Next to him is world, where lives astrophysics manipulating with numbers, which are so big that do not have names. These two worlds exist next to each other.
Harbour
Time and space have a different meaning here. People go naked, just like they were born, lacking any insignia of rank, position or importance in society. They observe strange rituals, voluntarily subjecting themselves to torture, and trying to wash off the dust of their lives.
Flying over Blue Field
A man sits alone in a plane built at home, and keeps his balance between life and death. During his flight, immense landscapes pass by, half-deserted streets. Silence and waiting are all around. A film about solitude in the endless sky. Part poetry, silence and meditation.
Antigravitation
An isolated village in the Lithuanian countryside. Seated in her house, an elderly woman recites an old folk story. Then she climbs up the tall ladder that takes her to the rooftop of the church. Through her eyes we see the whole village from up high, immense, that is changing with the changing of the seasons. How does the world appear from such an altitude?
Apostle of ruins
The film depicts a Georgian, thrown of to Lithuania, his loneliness and longing for the lost homeland. An attempt to give a meaning to his existence in ruins of things and time.
Earth of the Blind
The film springs from at least three ideas connected to each other in an irrational way: the story of a cow being taken to the butcher, the description of simple pleasures, how to ascend to the top of a hill and descend in a wheelbarrow, and the portraiture of a several blind people. The great, big eyes of the cows are seen in contrast to the unseeing eyes of the blind people.
Baltic Way
A film about the Baltic Way, the event that shook the empire. Baltic Way was a peaceful political demonstration that occurred on August 23, 1989. Approximately two million people joined their hands to form a human chain spanning over 600 kilometres across the three Baltic states.
Open the door to him who comes
A filmmaker encounters a priest who is full of faith and optimism for the future, notwithstanding the hard times of poverty and indifference. The film is completely focused on the observation of affairs and people, of listening to the sounds that help to create another dimension of extraordinary depth. The accounts that father Stanislovas tells join with many images of those who cross the path of the Stonys cinema, and leave a lasting impression.
I Walked Through Fire, You Were With Me
The latest film by renowned Lithuanian filmmaker Audrius Stonys relates the story of Mr. Kriauleidziai and his wife, who lost the roof over their heads after fire engulfed their home. The film also demonstrates man’s ability to come to terms with misfortune, not to lose heart, but to start afresh.
Film director and producer. Member of EDN and the European Film Academy. Made 16 films as an independent filmmaker and producer. Films received many awards at international festivals, including Nyon, Split, Bornholm, Neu Brandenburg, Bilbao, Florence, Oberhausen and San Francisco. His 1992 film Earth of the Blind received the Felix Award from the European Film Academy for the Best European Documentary Film. 2004-2005 Documentary teacher at European Film College, Denmark. Lectures in Barcelona, Tokyo, Berkeley, Stanford, Belgrade. Representative of Lithuania in Eurimages. Retrospectives and master classes: Switzerland, Russia, France, Japan, Israel, Czech Republic, Germany, New York, San Francisco, Belgium, Spain, Italy.
1989 “Open the door to him, who comes” 35mm
1990 “Baltic Way” 35mm (together with A.Matelis)
1992 “Earth of the Blind” 35mm
1992 “Apostle of ruins” 35mm
1995 “Antigravitation” 35mm, San Francisco Film Festival Certificate of Merit, Bornholm “Balticum” Film Festival Special Prize, Vilnius Film Forum Prize for the Best Direction, San Denis Film Festival Jury Award
1996 “Flying over blue field” 35mm, Bornholm “Balticum” Film Festival 2nd Prize, Neubrandenburg DokumentArt Findling prize.
1998 “Harbour” 35mm
1999 “Fedia. Three minutes after the Big Bang” 35mm, San Francisco Golden Gate Awards Certificate of Merit, Neubrandenburg DokumentArt Findling prize
2000 “510 seconds of silence” (together with A.Matelis) 35mm/Beta SP, 4th position in Top10 in Expo 2000 Hanover
2000 ”Alone” 35mm, Nyon Film Festival “Visions du Reel” Public Prize, Gyor Film Festival “Mediawave 2001” Special Prize, Split The International Festival of New Film Grand Prix VIII, Independent Film Festival of Barcelona Special Mention, Lithuanian Film Makers Union Prize of the Year 2001, International Film Festival “Arsenals” Kodak Vision Award
2002 “Last car” 35mm, selected for the official competition programs in: Rotterdam International Film festival, Rio de Janeiro Short Film festiva,l Tampere short film festiva,l Melbourne International Film festival, Leeds International Film festival
2004 “Countdown” 35mm, Rio de Janeiro Film Festival, “Cinema du Reel” Paris, IDFA Amsterdam International Film Festival
2006 “Uku ukai” World premiere at International Film Festival Amsterdam IDFA 2006, “Uku ukai” received “Golden Mikeldi” in Bilbao International Film festival, Best Short Film Award at ArtFilm, Trencin, Slovakia, Lorenzo de Medici Award at Festival dei Popoli, Florence
2007 “The Bell”
2008 “Four Steps”
2010 “I walked through fire, You were with me”
2011 “RAMIN”
His films got many international film awards. Among them Public prize in Nyon, Grand Prix in Split, prizes in Bornholm, Gyor, Neu Brandenburg, Oberhausen, Bilbao and San Francisco.
In 1992 the film “Earth of the Blind” received European Film Academy award “FELIX” as the Best European Documentary film of the Year.