‘In The Land Of Arto’ review: Camille Cottin and Zar Amir star in thoughtful Armenian drama

Dir: Tamara Stepanyan. France/Armenia. 2025. 104mins.

Celine (Camille Cottin) heads from France to Armenia in June 2021, six months after the death by suicide of her husband Arto. She thinks it will be a quick trip to collect his birth certificate so she can claim her children’s citizenship. In fact, it marks the start of a journey that will take Celine across the country to discover the truth about her husband, in a film that explores tensions between exile and homecoming, and the haunting impact of war on those who leave and those who remain.

Stepanyan’s documentary background shines through in her treatment of Armenia as a character

The first fiction feature from Armenia-born, France-based Tamara Stepanyan is her second film this year, after the highly persona documentary My Armenian Phantoms premiered in Berlin’s Forum. This thoughtful and melancholic drama also deals with ghosts of the past and is informed by the country’s history of conflict – specifically the First Nagorno-Karabakh War between 1992 and 1994, and the bubbling pressure in the region that exploded in the Azerbaijani offensive of 2023.

Stepanyan (working with co-writers Jean-Christophe Ferrari, Jean Breschand, Romy Coccia di Ferro and Jihane Chouaib), invites the viewer to retrace Arto’s footsteps alongside Celine while learning something along the way. It is a contemplative and humanistic choice for Locarno’s opening film, which is likely to strike a chord with audiences looking for more cerebral fare. In distribution terms, it will no doubt be helped by the internationally recognised Call My Agent! star Cottin and the presence of 2022 Cannes best actress winner Zar Amir (Holy Spider) in support.

Celine gets her first shock at the register office, when she is told her deceased husband Arto Saryan never existed. His personal details do, however, match another name in their books, that of Arto Santrosian. Celine is confronted with further revelations after hunting those who once knew Arto – including the assertion he was an army deserter.

Stepanyan lets her characters drive a narrative that takes its time to establish the direction of travel, lending the action a naturalistic feel. As Celine tries to cope with the discovery, she crosses paths with Arsine (Amir), a French-speaking Armenian whose father still lives in the contested Karabakh region. Arsine offers both a sympathetic ear and the possibility of getting to Aghdam, the place where the episode that led Arto to desert unfolded.

The director’s ruminative and rangy approach allows characters to come and go, including Shant Hovhannisyan as a sympathetic taxi driver, Babken Chobanyan as Arsine’s war-wounded partner, and Denis Lavant in a late arriving but arresting cameo as a war veteran. There is also a significant moment during a minibus journey, when Celine’s fellow passenger sings along to a rap song on the radio, ’Hascen Im Nuynn A’ (’My Address Is The Same’), which is about displacement and the desire to return. The passenger is played by the rapper himself Valeri Lyoka Ghazaryan – who records as Lyoka and is well-known in Armenia – an Artsakh native whose family fled the 1992 fighting in real life, adding a subtle extra poignancy to the scene.

Cottin and Amir navigate both the strength and fragility of their characters with care – Celine tries to come to terms with what has been lost, while Arsine focuses on trying to save her country’s future. Elsewhere, Stepanyan’s documentary background shines through in her treatment of Armenia as a character in its own right. The camerawork from Claire Mathon (Portrait Of A Lady On Fire, Spencer) is attentive, not just to the subtle shifts in Cottin and Amir’s performances but to the landscapes and environments through which the pair pass – from a goldfish bowl and dog-eared filing at the register office, to the forests and mountains en route to Karabakh. 

Stepanyan also is not afraid to take a risk or two, leading us into Celine’s headspace and imagined interactions with her husband’s ‘spirit’ with restraint and elegance. Laying ghosts to rest may not be easy in a conflict zone, but Stepanyan suggests that understanding the past may help the living find peace.