‘Russians At War' Director & Producer Talk Backlash & Direct-To-Audience Release: 'The Best Counter To The Protests & Hate Is For People To See The Film'

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2 days ago

Director Anastasia Trofimova and producer Cornelia Principe are launching a direct-to-audience release this week of the former's controversial documentary Russians at War, in a bid to get it seen after a year of protests and cancellations.
The two-hour work gives sobering insight into the futility and carnage of armed conflict through the lives of Russia-aligned soldiers on the front of the country's unprovoked war against Ukraine, with whom Trofimova embedded over a period of seven months.
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After an incident-free world premiere at the Venice Film Festival last year, the doc met with protests in Canada from pro-Ukraine groups ahead of its North American premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), with the former deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland, who is of Ukrainian descent, leading the charge.
The protestors accused the film of being Russian propaganda – in a war of Russia's instigation in which more than 13,500 Ukrainian civilians and between 60,000 to 100,000 military personal have been killed and another 10 million people have been displaced – although none of them had seen the film at that point. At least 250,000 Russian troops have died in the conflict.
TIFF canceled the festival screening, instead playing the film in the TIFF Lightbox Theatre on the first Tuesday after its 2024 edition ended, using security staff who were still on site to ensure the safety of Trofimova, her producers and the spectators in the room.
'Anastasia had her very own security detail. I had someone following me around even when I went to the bathroom. When we were on stage for the Q&A, there was a line of security in front of us. People who came had to be security scanned. It was a quite a production, but the festival had to make sure everybody was safe,' recounts Principe.
The Oscar-nominated Canadian producer (To Kill A Tiger) produced the documentary under her Raja Pictures banner with Sally Blake and Philippe Levasseur at Paris-based Capa Presse.
The fallout would continue throughout the year with Athens and Zurich among festivals which pulled the film due to protests and security concerns.
Principe also reveals that the International Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) rescinded an invitation issued in August 2024 for its Best of Fests sidebar saying they could not create a constructive dialog around the work.
'That was surprising,' she says of the disinvite, which occurred under the radar before the festival unveiled its lineup.
In the meantime, the push back has only strengthened the film team's resolve to get the film seen, with the producers opting for a direct-to-audience strategy.
'The best counter to the protests and the anger is for people to see the film,' says Principe. '99% of the protests came from people who hadn't seen the film… I totally agree that peaceful protest is a great and constructive way to voice one's opinion, but it would be nice also to see the film.'
Principe cites documentaries such as Brett Story and Stephen Maing's Union, following Amazon workers as they attempt to unionize, and Oscar-winning documentary No Other Land, which also released direct-to-audience, as inspirations for going down the self-distribution route.
'For films that are potentially controversial for some communities or some groups or corporations, going direct-to-audience seems to be the way to go,' says Principe. 'Getting it out there as far and wide as possible was really our plan and it seemed more and more after things happened in Canada and TIFF, that doing it ourselves was the way to go.'
Working with the direct-to-audience platform of tech entertainment company Gathr, the producers have created the www.russiansatwar.com website, where spectators will be able to gain paid access to the film from August 12.
'It took months and months to get our website together. It's a very fulsome website with lots of content to give people background on the making of the film, frequently asked questions, criticisms that we address, all that is there,' says Principe.
The release is worldwide but excludes Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, with the production planning to make it available in those territories for free at a later date.
'That's going to be a separate release because it will be free and we need to make sure that it can actually be accessed in Russia, says Principe.
An experienced TV producer and documentarian, who has also worked in Syria and Iraq, Trofimova knew the film would receive pushback from some quarters for the human light in which it portrayed the Russia-aligned soldiers but was not prepared for the full-out backlash it sparked as it embarked on its festival tour last year.
'I think it was easier to go to the front and to be in the war than to deal with what happened afterwards because it was so unexpected. The documentary community has been very supportive overall and very understanding, but what was a shock to me is, how easy it is to be accused of something that people say you did, not that you actually did or said yourself,' she says.
'Most of the people who have been attacking this film, and the most vicious attacks, of course, have been happening online, have not seen the film… In Toronto, where we were the top news story for at least a week, journalists asked the protesters, 'Have you seen the film?' They would reply, 'No, we have not, and we refuse to.' What was surprising for me was, why this anger directed at the film? Why this anger directed at me? Because it's like I became their personal enemy, or the film became their personal enemy.'
The fallout has also raised questions for Trofimova around the power of coordinated deplatforming campaigns.
'It has been quite interesting to realize how easy it is for anyone in the documentary community to be attacked and silenced by some sort of interest group, because it didn't take that much to be honest. A lot of the stuff is online. It's quite organized. There's been quite a coordinated defamation deplatforming campaign against this film,' she says.
'It's left quite a bit of damage. I'm not talking about our emotional state, but rather the fact that it started off so well. It was receiving invitations from the world's top festivals and the attacks on it made it so much more difficult for people to program it and to see it. That was the shocking thing.'
She also questions the implications of what happened to her for other documentarians who want to tackle controversial and complex topics in the future
'It made me wonder how do we make complex films? It's a question for anyone who wants to take on a big, controversial problem in the world, and we have a lot of them. Now more than ever, documentaries have this huge responsibility to try to explain, to tackle them, to analyze them, to get in there. What do we have to be prepared for as filmmakers next time we go in?,' she says.
Trofimova is not certain it is safe for her return to Russia any time soon given the unflattering light in which Russians at War portrays conditions at the front for the country's soldiers, but she hopes to able to return one day to continue a personal mission to capture Russian stories that are told neither in the local media, or internationally.
'The thing about war documentaries is that if you're just faithfully observing and recording this reality, you cannot make anything but an anti -war film, because the longer you stay and the longer you see the futility and how people who are very dear to someone back home, they're just gone. And the same thing goes for both sides… it becomes very, very tragic.'
Principe notes how this time last year, she and Trofimova were iin Paris finishing post-production on the work ahead of the Venice premiere.
'A year ago, we were looking forward to Venice. A year later, we're looking forward to releasing the film online, so that people can see it and judge for themselves,' she says.
'They don't have to love the film. They have to don't agree with the film, but watch it and then, we'd love to hear what you think.'
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