Zaza Urushadze

Zaza Urushadze
Zaza Urushadze seen first on the right.
Born	Tbilisi, Georgian SSR, Soviet Union (now Georgia)
Nationality	Georgian
Years active	1989 - present
Known for	Tangerines (2013)

Zaza Urushadze (Georgian: ზაზა ურუშაძე) (born 30 October 1965) is a Georgian film director, screenwriter and producer.

Zaza Urushadze is a son of Ramaz Urushadze, famous Soviet football goalkeeper. He was born on October 30, 1965, in Tbilisi, Georgia.

He graduated in 1982-1988 at the directing department of the Shota Rustaveli Theatre and Film Georgian State University. In 2002-2004 he was the director of the Georgian National Film Centre.

Zaza's full-length debut - film Here Comes the Dawn (1998) was very successful and participated in many international film festivals. It was Georgia's official Best Foreign Language Film submission at the 72nd Academy Awards, but did not manage to receive a nomination.

From 2003 to 2006 Zaza Urushadze was director of TV Series - Ckheli Dzagli. The project became successful, but 4th season was banned by Georgian Government cause of its political themes. The director left his job to start work at his new project - Three Houses.

Zaza's second full-length film Three Houses was finished in 2008. Film participated in international film festival (including Montreal World Film Festival). In the December, 2009 Zaza Urushadze’s film opened the program of Georgian Filmweek in Tallinn, Estonia. During the meeting with Artur Veeber and Tatjana Mühlbeier was born an idea to write a script of Tangerines.

Tangerines, which was the first Estonian-Georgian co-production, was finished in 2013 became one of the successfully and worldwide acclaimed film in Georgian Film history. The story takes place during the war in Georgia, Apkhazeti region in 1990, an Estonian man, Ivo, has stayed behind to harvest his crops of tangerines. When a wounded man is left at his door, Ivo has no choice but to take him in.