US based Albanian screenwriter in Albania for Sworn Virgin movie

TIRANA, July 25 – After his success with the Forgiveness of Blood, Andamion Murataj, an Albanian screenwriter based in New York, is back home this time for a script focusing on the world famous Albanian sworn virgins. The Forgiveness of Blood focusing on blood feuds gave Murataj the Silver Bear at the Berlinale 2011 film festival for the best script.
“Work on the movie has already started considering that the project has been selected by European institutions for its further progress and a group of producers are following this project. I am in Albania to continue with the second draft of the script. Of course the Puglia Film Commission and eQuinoxe Europe are interested in the further development of this project based on the strong interest this project has sparked among the best European producers participating in this event,” says Murataj.
Murataj was selected as one of ten international screenwriters for the Puglia Experience 2013″, the travelling screenwriter’s workshop for professional TV and film writers.
Murataj, who has worked as a script writer and filmmaker in New York for more than a decade, is already researching on his new script on sworn virgins which he has named the “Man of the House”.
Albanian sworn virgins, locally known as Burrnesha are women who take a vow of chastity and wear male clothing in order to live as men in the patriarchal northern Albanian society.
The practice was born from traditional, northern Albanian law, the Kanun of Lek Dukagjin, which believed that women belonged to their fathers until marriage, and then became the property of their husbands. Becoming a ‘sworn virgin’ did allow women to escape from unwanted arranged marriages.
Nowadays, there are only about forty sworn virgins left. As women were granted more and more rights, fewer and fewer girls felt the need to adopt a male identity for themselves or their families, researchers say.