Zaza Urushadze

Zaza Urushadze (Georgian: ზაზა ურუშაძე; October 30, 1965 – December 7, 2019) was a Georgian film director, screenwriter, and producer.

He graduated in 1988 from the directing department of the Shota Rustaveli Theatre and Film Georgian State University. From 2002 to 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 receive a nomination.

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

Tangerines, the first Estonian-Georgian co-production, was finished in 2013. It became one of the most successful and worldwide acclaimed films in Georgian film history. The story takes place during the war in Georgia, where, in the 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.