,The first day of the Golden Apricot festival started with the apricot blessing ceremony took place at St. Anna Church on Sunday.
As the official website of the festival reports, afterwards the honorary stars of directors Frunze Dovlatyan, Yuri Yerznkyan and cinematographer Sergey Israyelyan were placed at Charles Aznavour square among other prolific masters of the Armenian Cinema.
The festival was officially launched in the evening at Moscow Cinema, followed by the Red Carpet Ceremony. Welcoming speeches were made by Harutyun Khachatryan, Golden Apricot Yerevan International Film Festival Founding Director and Ralph Yirikian, General Manager of VivaCell- MTS- General Sponsor of the festival. Afterwards competition programs and the intentional jury boards were presented.
At the end of the ceremony KHAS-PUSH -the opening film by celebrated Armenian director Hamo Beknazaryan was screened.
To note, the 14th Golden Apricot Yerevan International Film Festival will be held from July 9-16. This year the festival received about 1100 film submissions from 96 countries. More than hundred films were included in the competition and non-competition programs.