AND ONLY THAT

Scriptwriter Rustam Ibrahimbayov: "Rasim Ocaqov is someone who is close to me in outlook and in his understanding of many things in human relations, in life."

Composer Emin Sabitoglu: "I value him highly as a person, as a friend and as a great, fantastic film director and thinker. He is one of the best directors in Azerbaijan." 

Cameraman Kanan Mam-madov: "Rasim Ocaqov is, of course, a master of film, a great professional, he knows it all from the inside…"

Actor Fahraddin Manafov: "I am simply convinced that without Ocaqov I could not have made it as an actor."

To be better 

We were too late. We looked everywhere for an author who could really write about Rasim Ocaqov - the 75th anniversary of his birth was in November. We looked for someone who knew him. But one person was away, another asked us to wait as they were frantically busy. But no-one refused. When they heard the name of the great man, they said: "What a pity that he's no longer with us. He was a good man. It's very hard without him and it's difficult to write about him - the pain at his loss has not gone away and never will." "We need to write about him differently but I don't know how," a famous film critic said to us one day. We can only regret that we will never meet this man, never be able to talk to him. It is like regret for our lost childhood that will never return. We really want to watch his films. We are not film critics but viewers. We can just say: "Rasim Ocaqov's films are so sincere and real that they create a lump in the throat and goose pimples on the skin." But aren't feature films made for ordinary viewers? And aren't the masterpieces of cinema shot so that viewers should afterwards think about true, eternal, immutable values? You have to think that each one of us becomes a little better after watching one of this great director's marvellous films. Maybe this was the basis of Rasim Ocaqov's mission on Earth - to be a good person and thereby to make the world around him better too. Time is passing and we have no moral right not to remember Rasim Ocaqov and this piece can be dedicated only to his directorial genius. But in this case we laymen would have to cheat. It would probably be better to create a short "literary" extract of everything that the people with whom he worked have said about Rasim Ocaqov - in memory of a great creative and amazing person, and, as was said about him, one of the last Mohicans of Azerbaijani cinema.

Actor Aleksandr Kalyagin: "...And the matchmaking began and Rasim, very modestly, very quietly, presumably afraid that I would say no, began to talk about the film Interrogation… I said: 'Let's read the script.' Of course, I realized that I would be swimming in unfamiliar waters. All that kept me buoyant was Rustam Ibrahimbayov. I knew that everything that he writes is always of good quality, always good, always interesting… Now I can say that I am happy that Rustam introduced me to this amazing, marvellous person, Rasim Ocaqov, while Rasim for his part really introduced me to Azerbaijan."

Author Anar: "The most ideal director, a marvellous person, a selfless friend; when he was on the set, it was very difficult to distract him."

Actor Fahraddin Manafov: "As a result he was right in 99 per cent of cases. Sometimes we only realize this later. That's probably why he made such films, authentic, accurate and honourable."

Actor Aleksandr Kalyagin: "Rasim, you knew how to do everything to make an actor comfortable, relaxed, able to improvise, and that was your skill. Not every director can do this."

Actor Fahraddin Manafov: "He had everything - a perfect, calibrated formula. And nothing should be added to this formula or taken away from it."

Actor Stanislav Sadalskiy: "Rasim Ocaqov was someone who was devoted to his profession and to the team with whom he worked. He had an indispensable scriptwriter: almost all his films, at least those that I've seen, he made with Rustam Ibrahimbayov. And he had his regular actors whom he trusted. One of them was Aleksandr Kalyagin. Sasha was his standard, his talisman, a great sparring partner, 'the light in his window'. That's how his relationship with the actor struck me. I remember with great warmth my work with him on the film Park."

Actress Safiqa Mammadova: "I have worked with many directors. But my best performances are all linked with Rasim Ocaqov; the Azerbaijani State Prize for the film Birthday, and the USSR State Prize for the film Interrogation."

Actor Rodion Nakhapetov: "At that time I was already sizing myself up as a director and analysed Rasim Ocaqov's professional approach. I liked his ability to create a benevolent atmosphere in which the artist blossomed. There were no commanding officer tones, no ostentation, just laconic, trusting explanation. Everything was calm, without any panic or strain, without posing. He did not see an actor as a companion in the film but as a foreman with whom the film was built." 

Actor Yuriy Yakovlev: "I try to work with directors who love actors and understand the nature of their work on a role. Rasim Ocaqov was such a director when I worked with him on the film Seven Days After Murder. He created an atmosphere of commitment and made it a pleasure to work with one another. We developed great respect for one another."

Scripwriter Rustam Ibrahim-bayov: "He was making The Sound of a Pipe, had shot a lot of material and asked me to watch it. The material was interesting but I didn't like some things. I am a direct person and began to tell him. Rasim listened to me, nodded… Then he seemed to have spotted something on the floor, he leant forward and suddenly fell over, hitting his head on the parquet floor with a horrible crack. And he died. That is, for several minutes he was completely switched off. We took him to the first aid point, doctors came running: he had no pulse, nothing… Suddenly Rasim opened his eyes and said; 'What did you say to me about the film?' I said, 'What are you talking about? What film?' He said: 'No, you said such and such.' And picking up a pencil and paper he continued the conversation as though nothing had happened."

Cameram Rafiq Qambarov, State Prize winner: "In 1978 I was starting out as a cameraman. He took me by the hand and led me into the world of film. He was making Interrogation at the time. And he had just enjoyed enormous success with Birthday. I think this is one of the best of his films, brilliant directorial work. And there is a national theme here too. These films marked the start of the successful, long collaboration between scriptwriter Rustam Ibrahimbayov and director Rasim Ocaqov. After this Rasim Ocaqov made another 14 films on which he always used me as cameraman. In 1980 Interrogation received first prize at the all-union festival in Dushanbe. In 1981 seven people from the film crew received the USSR State Prize. This happened 33 years after Arsin Mal Alan received the Stalin Prize in 1948 (that was the name of the State Prize then). Rasim Ocaqov thereby confirmed once more the high quality of Azerbaijani cinema. After this I worked on several more films with him - Behind the Closed Door, Park, Temple of the Air and others.

Author Anar: "He studied at the All-Union State Film Institute, one of the best cinematography training institutions in the world, when Italian neo-realism dominated cinema. Films by Roberto Rossellini, Vittorio De Sica, Giuseppe De Santis, Luchino Visconti and other famous masters, cinema classics such as Rome, Open City, Bicycle Thieves, Rome 11 O'Clock, Rocco and His Brothers and Two Cents Worth of Hope determined Ocaqov's artistic passions for the rest of his life. The great Federico Fellini a pupil of this style, later dug neo-realism's grave. This is not all down to Fellini's unique genius, of course, who presented a completely different type of cinema to the world. Neo-realism had exhausted itself as that real economic and social situation that had given birth to it had disappeared in Italy. And Fellini was the first to realize this, followed to some extent by Antonioni and Pasolini and later Visconti. Rasim Ocaqov became one of the founders of this style in our Azerbaijani cinema, and remained loyal to it, not because he could not rid himself of the charms of his student aesthetics, but because Azerbaijani reality was waiting for its artist of the cinema who would depict our national reality, not in saccharine, false ersatz films which imitated life, but in genuinely realistic, or neo-realistic if you like, works. Rasim Ocaqov expresses his artistic self in his films. This does not mean at all that he is filming about himself. But it means that he films what worries him as an artist and a citizen. And this is what guided his choice of scripts. In his films he uses unique touches in some everyday details. I once asked him: 'Rasim, when you come home, why do you drink boiled water straight from the spout of the kettle?' 'How do you know I do that?' he asked surprised. 'From your films - that's what the hero does, the actor Fahraddin Manafov, in Tahmina and in Hotel Room. This can't be a coincidence.' Rasim agreed, smiling."

We are always rushing somewhere. We hurry and hurry and are still too late to say something very important to one another. And then a person passes away, and a whole world goes with him…