French-Armenian filmmaker Arnaud Khayadjanian’s documentary film “Stony Paths” is included in the Armenian Panorama Competition of the Golden Apricot International Film Festival. The film presents the story of a journey to Anatolia. Arnaud Khayadjanian starts his journey to Turkey on the lands of his ancestors who survived the Armenian Genocide. Starting from a painting, casual meetings and stories about Arno’s relatives, the film reveals the least known acts of pious people, that is, all the unknown people who saved lives in 1915.

The film received the jury’s special award at this year’s international film festival in Ismayilia.

During a press conference, Khayadjanian said when he was 20, he found out that his forefather was from Western Armenia, had hidden from the Turks during the Armenian Genocide and how a Kurd found and saved him.

“I started asking my family members many questions, but they were left unanswered since talking about the Armenian Genocide was forbidden. I decided to go to Anatolia, particularly the village where my forefather was born. I decided to shoot a film to present the pious people who saved the Armenians during the days of the genocide,” the young film director said.

According to Arnaud Khayadjanian, it took him two years to conduct research and meet the members of families having survived the Armenian Genocide. “I realized that there was always one person who saved any one of the members of the families that survived the Armenian Genocide,” he said.

Khayadjanian stated that he had focused more on the charity acts and people who had saved the Armenians, not the bad sides.

“There is some information about such people in some books, but the information is not detailed. I have watched many documentary films in which the director has shown an aggressive attitude towards the Turks. As I mentioned, I tried to focus on the good sides so that there can be dialogue with the Turks,” the director said.

The young French-Armenian filmmaker mentioned that Frenchmen accept him as an Armenian due to his last name, Armenians accept him as a Frenchmen since he doesn’t speak Armenian and that the Turks accept him as an Armenian because of his last name.

“My next film will be about the Armenian identity and my emotions that are always mixed,” he added, as reported panorama.am.

Arnaud said he would be traveling to Artsakh to present his film in two days. The French-Armenian filmmaker is interested in the Nagorno-Karabakh war and the current situation in the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic.

“It’s interesting why the Nagorno-Karabakh war is not presented in many films. I have a friend who made a film devoted to the Nagorno-Karabakh war as a diploma work. Currently, I am conducting research on the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh and the Nagorno-Karabakh war so that my next film is devoted to the war. I will return to Nagorno-Karabakh to continue in a month,” Khayadjanian said.

Arnaud Khayadjanian’s 2012 documentary film “Lost Horizons” has been shown and has received awards at 22 international film festivals. In 2014, his short-length film “The Bad Girl”, which is based on a French play, became very popular and had over 1,000,000 views. The film has been shown at 15 international film festivals, including at the Upsala Film festival. It has received a Vimeo Award, as well as the jury’s award at the Sundance TV Awards.