The best Veriko Anjaparidze’s action movies

The Great Warrior Skanderbeg (Albanian: Skenderbeu, Russian: Velikiy voin Albanii Skanderbeg) is a 1953 Albanian-Soviet drama film directed by Sergei Yutkevich. It was entered into the 1954 Cannes Film Festival where it earned the International Prize. Yutkevich also earned the Special Mention award for his direction. The film is a biography of George Kastriot Skanderbeg (1405 – 1468), widely known as Skanderbeg, a 15th-century Albanian lord who defended his land against the Ottoman Empire for more than two decades.

In Arabic, “mameluke” means a white slave, a prisoner. In Egypt, this name was given to prisoners of war who had been sold into slavery from Georgia and other countries of the Caucasus. The action of this drama starts in Georgia in the late 18th century. Two friends are abducted and sold into slavery. One ends up in Egypt, the other - in Venice. Years later, they meet by the ancient pyramids, in the desert where a battle is going on between the armies of Bonaparte and Ali-bey, the ruler of Egypt. In a combat with a French officer, the Mameluke injures him. Falling from his horse onto the sand, the officer exclaims in Georgian: “Vai, nana!” (“Oh, mother!”). And the Mameluke recognizes in him a mate of his childhood games.