"New Cinema in Kyrgyzstan": Special edition of Kinokultura

The book published with the support of the Bishkek International Film Festival in June 2025.

May 2025 - Special edition of Kinokultura: please open here

Edited by Gulbara Tolomushova and Sultan Usuvaliev

Editorial by Sultan Usuvaliev:

Kyrgyzstan is a country with a rapidly developing film industry. We are witnessing a dynamic growth of mainstream cinema, high attendance rates in movie theaters, the emergence of festivals, forums, and various initiatives, as well as the international recognition of auteur films. Yet all of this is takig place against a backdrop of absent or unsystematic academic film research and limited activity in the field of professional film criticism.

Significant contributions to Kyrgyz film studies and criticism have been-made by several generation of researchers – both those who devoted their entire careers to the profession and those who authored at least one monograph on national cinema: Kaarman Ashimov, Oleg Ertyukhov, Seyit Bokonbaev, Vladimir Mikhailov, Ekaterina Luzanova, Askerbek Sekimov, Edilbek Sarybaev, among others. Unfortunately, many of those who began writing about Kyrgyz cinema in the years of independence were forced to leave the profession due to the impossibility to make a living from it – a situation that remains relevant today.

For more than 30 years, Kyrgyz cinema has been studied and promoted by film scholar Gulbara Tolomushova. She published regularly in the media and in academic journals and is the author of the books Territoria Kinostan: lyrgyzskoe kino v litsakh (Territory Kinostan: Kyrgyz Cinema in Faces, 2009) ans Sila khrupkosti I zhestkost’ iskusstva. Zhenshchiny v kino Kyrgyzstana (The Strength of Fragility and the Harshness of Art: Women in Kyrgyz Cinema, 2017).

It is becoming increasingly clear that we face the urgent task of training a new generation of film-critics – those who can represent Kyrgyz cinema on the international stage, analyze contemporary film processes, and revisit the Soviet-Kyrgyz film legacy. Without academic analysis and professional criticism, in my view, there can be no sustainable growth or developing of our national cinema.

That is why the release of this special issue, dedicated to new cinema in Kyrgyzstan, is so important. This is the first collection entirely focused on the contemporary stage of our national cinematic development (2018-2024). The authors of this issue take on multiple roles: as historians, defining the contours of a historical moment, its periodization, and connection to context; as cartographers, mapping out the cinematic landscape; and as seismographs, registering the invisible shifts of tectonic plates.

This issue is intended not only for researches, but also for filmmakers themselves, whose premieres, regrettably, often take place without a single published review. Here they receive what they regularly call for in public discussions: a critical analysis of their work.

First and foremost, I would like to thank Birgit Beumers – this issue’s concept and initiative belong to her. I am also grateful to each author who found the time and energy to contribute their work. And I thank the Directorate of the Bishkek International Film festival for the decision to prepare and publish this issue in three languages – and our entire team who worked on bringing it to print.