Programme Director Bernd Buder on 31.03.2022
Vilnius film festival boycotts Russian films
Vilnius is the first European festival to actively boycott Russian cinema, while also organising its own Ukrainian Cinema Day and some Ukraine-focused events as part of the industry focus Meeting Point. What do you think of these initiatives?
It is important to sustainably support the Ukrainian film scene as an integral part of the European film landscape. There is already a broad basis for this with existing co-production relationships, festival networks, etc., which have been actively built up by both sides and can be further deepened in Vilnius. Filmmakers play an important role in reflecting on the war of aggression with all its consequences for people, the environment and infrastructure; a corresponding exchange serves to define this role more precisely and to see how Ukrainian filmmakers can be supported concretely. In our next edition, we intend to present Ukrainian cinema in as many programme sections as possible to show how integrated it is in the European film family. I can emotionally understand the boycott of Russian films, but I don't think it's the right way to break off the dialogue with filmmakers who don't support the Russian hegemonic course or are in opposition to Putin.
On the boycott of Russian films on 21.3.2022
Festivals cancel Russian (co-)productions, Cinestar takes "Abteil Nr.6" out of the program and then apologizes for the "misunderstanding".
On the boycott of Russian films and how the FFC reacts, here is the Tagesspiegel article by Christiane Peitz with a statement by program director Bernd Buder.
Deputy Program Director Joshua Jadi and FFC Curator Jana Riemann on the question:
Is the Cottbus Film Festival boycotting Russia?
Here the article, published in the Lausitzer Rundschau.
Programme director Bernd Buder on 12.3.2022:
"(...) even the rather state-loyal Mosfilm head Karen Shakhnazarov does not like the war (...)"
Here is an interesting Tagesspiegel article on this.
Programme Director Bernd Buder on 10.3.2022:
"This morning we received another statement from a Russian world distributor on the war against Ukraine, which also shows the dilemma faced by many filmmakers in Russia in particular, who do not agree with their president's course of war and position themselves too largely against his policies: Calls for boycott from outside, pressure from within. After the amendment of the media law, it is, after all, forbidden to speak of the war under threat of imprisonment, which is what the three *** in the statement stand for."
Statement "antidote":
Thank you for your words of encouragement and support that you write to us!
Our relatives, friends and colleagues live in Ukraine, and many of us are related by kinship.
We hope common sense will prevail, and peace will reign in the near future.
The best thing we can do is cooperation and being friends.
Let's keep in touch.
Make films, festivals and love not ***.
Programme Director Bernd Buder on 9.3.2022:
"New things happen all the time, all the time one would have to revise, adapt what was said yesterday. Today I read a good interview with Roman Bondarchuk, a Ukrainian director from whom we also already had a film in the programme, which denounces the mental preparation of hostility towards nations and thus the lead to the ideological basis of this war in Russian cinema, specifically in Alexei Balabanov's "Brat"."
You can read the interview here.