Tekla Aslanishvili. ‘A State in a State’

A State in a State is an experimental documentary film that follows the processes of construction, disruption, and fragmentation of railroads in the South Caucasus and Caspian regions. It examines railways as the technical materialization of the fragile political borders that have reemerged after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Revolving around the scenes of delay and waiting that constitute cargo mobility, the film reads the optimistic narratives about the New Silk Road against the grain. It observes how the iron foundation of connectivity between places and people can be used as a weapon of exclusion and geopolitical sabotage.

Dotting the same lines, other forms of sabotage are deployed by workers to disrupt the political violence. Looking at historic and current practices of resistance A State in a State explores the potential of railroads for building a different, infrastructural consciousness and the lasting, transnational, kinship among the people who live and work around them.