in the light of russia's film industry who is not overly optimistic about its future talks with alexander who directed the movie faust which won the venice film festivals top prize the golden lion stay with us for that. oh at. hello again to walk and to spotlight the interview show on it. today my guest is aleksandr the self quarter joining us from st peters. this year's venice film festival has been a great success from russia to the movie called fast directed last night paula was awarded the gold blog the festival's growth critics say that's a sign of the industry's revival but the self is not so optimistic this is

a tour of thanks to the logistics of filmmaking in russia still leaves much to be desired and less the support of is our guest on. our sound so curled for this year's biggest victory at the venice film festival alexander secure of help to overcome much misunderstanding in his or the career his student films were mostly not accepted by his teachers at the state film school in moscow and his early works were banned by soviet censors what helped secure of move on then was support from one of the greatest filmmakers of all time andre turkle. the end of the nineteen eighties and gorbachev zero team as a rule the force of guru whose films were finally released to receive acclaim both at home and abroad the filmmaker could finally quench his thirst for work make and several films a year both speeches and documentaries secure of zin person they stick works mocked

by a philosophical approach to history and human nature one then lots of intellectuals worldwide one of the filmmakers trademarks. and there are people in his fiction films secure. famous for experimenting with film language he's russian ark became a sensation in two thousand and two as it was made in this single ninety six minute long shot in the one nine hundred ninety six worked on his famous to truly exploring the effects of the war on one's personality the first three films were biographies of some of the most powerful political leaders of the twentieth century and hero. the force whom of the to troll would you post brought securities biggest cinema to graphic award the golden lion of the venice film festival.

mr secure a friend thank you very much for joining us good afternoon and a warm welcome from st petersburg. first of all i would like to congratulate you on the goldline award for the it's a great achievement for the russian filmmaking industry as well as for you personally. but before we start discussing the warden events that surrounded i would like you to comment on the latest news of the russian filmmaking community channel after all so what's your take on this scandal around russia's pick for the ketamine wards i mean synods. after the official vote the chairman of russia's oscar committee refused to sign the papers. how can that happen. what's your view on that and what you. i don't have an opinion on this issue really i wasn't aware of it before i saw it

in the newspapers i didn't know about russia's nominating a movie for an oscar either i read about it later also in the newspapers and heard about it on the radio. i think what's happened is all down to our human nature decisions are taken by humans it must have been a personal conflict. anyway why do you think epic isn't fit to run for an oscar we are aware of styria types the americans have of russia we often know the artistic taste of the academy members. film may well be the right choice for an oscar but why should european style serious movies of humanitarian carol to compete for what is basically a commercial prize. over all this story didn't really stir any emotions in me. that was the mr sick or if maybe this the weight should be. off it was

against the nomination of this film are good primarily that this film by mikhail cough was actually a poured over a larger movie just one of the ports but mr sokurov in the film that earned the golden line is also a part of your. which includes tourists in the sun and lastly you fall in on this fourth and last quarter receives the ward do you regard your false does an independent piece or a part of the. i mean that if the latter is true then the viewers who have not seen the previous parts will have to watch all of them first before seeing false. no it's a separate film each of the pause has its own value and leads a separate life but that's how it was the general idea behind the technology is humanitarian. not quite cinema to graphic. the roots of the method i employed i mean such fundamental studies could be traced

back to literature. it's not typical of cinematography neither russia nor international it may as well be a unique case the first case of such an in-depth study. as a director i cannot imagine that it would be possible to produce small or taurus or the sun and keep them on the shelf during all these years waiting for files to come out finalist is a separate film but you can also viewed as the last chapter of the tetralogy. well it's not the first time we talked to you in over the years i have come to know you a bit. what i mean is that i know you don't like the high life it's hard to imagine young magazines covers or gossip columns but then all of a sudden your the talk of the town the festivals hero the golden lion in your hands standing right there in the center of that celeb gathering what do you feel at the moment. well not much i'm afraid which would be

similar to what you have described because when al a television channels broadcast the news. i was still in venice. then i travelled back to st petersburg and wasn't very much affected by the whole thing. the only reason i felt that something really happened was a string of phone calls with congratulations from my friends relatives acquaintances and colleagues whom i deal in love. but it's actually not the first of my awards i have three vatican awards my movies regularly receive prizes though it's not usually reported. that's the conditions i work and. part of my joy is to take. a procedure i don't quite like either. my movies make their first steps for me a festival is not

a competition i have always been against competition the contemporary movie making industry doesn't offer other options that would be as efficient money wise to present to the international cinematography community as fast hauls. but the budgets for my movies do not include funds for promotion already not a single cent by the way we have a deficit budget for with only one copy printed so far. at the moment we don't really know how to show to russian viewers so i mean it's my job on the new year's eve i know that the next day on the first of january things will still be the same i know for sure. because they encourage my friends and colleagues who helped me make the movie and maybe they were happier about it than me everybody knows that you don't like film festivals you don't like the idea of

a competition held among artists as if they were athletes but you can't deny that film festivals are essential for the development of the film industry and filmmakers so you're kind of left in between. you don't know whether you're against film festivals or for them right definitely what is better to abolish them want to let them be. film festivals held in the form of film show like the one in venice are absolutely necessary it can be otherwise. wrong to hold film festivals as a competition. but almost anything. both renowned and experienced directors who do have a name in the film industry and beginners. who have. long been part of the cinema world are a nonpolitical for the newcomers for the young artists all along for awards attention recognition and fame far more than we do it would take me i don't need

any of these because i have grown out of this and when i really needed such things there were none today i realize that appreciation and attention as well as film distribution and television time i needed badly by young film directors and part of the audience needs all this as well we need a renewal we should give young people a chance this is not only true for films a film festival organizers a film show like the venice film festival and unlike hands or bilin that hold a film contest a kind of rivalry is the most reasonable and justified type of film festival as to the film competitions they should be abolished i have contacted the organizers of all the biggest film festivals and have been telling them for a number of years that the system of film competition has no future but they won't be making money without a competition because it's basically the competitive part of the festival it attracts people attract so what he means fans and sponsors i'm not sure. mr socor

off new films attract people this is what attracts people new films. the hamps but not the computer itself it is the desire and the opportunity to see new films that drives thousands to the festivals including the press and television says. award winning russian film director spotlight surely. very first verses of the bible. things are created but came. in god's image and it doesn't say just. sixty to seventy percent of what i did as a common soldier in the territories was to do with the turds doing what we call

making our presence felt to go out should some bozo they hear a knock on some doors run to the other corner and they don't know how religion and nationalism not just judaism have been a part of the problem they've been part of what leads to. bloodshed a few more bombed and killed. a thousand four hundred people in a month and you want to expect that this will have no effect until a few you have to be either extremely naive or extremely stupid enough to hear a religious jew calling another joe a not not the way they really are that amounting. to. the observed nature and discover it's. the communicate with the wind and. test

yourself and become free. see what nature can give you. download the official altie application to you on the phone on pod touch from the store. watch on t.v. lights on the go. video on demand. broadcasts and already says feeds now in the palm of your. question on the dot com. welcome back to spotlight i'm just a reminder that my guest on the show today. the award winning russian film director

mr sokurov after you won the gold mine award you said in one of your first interviews following the event i quote the current form of existence of the russian filmmaking industries fundamentally wrong and should be changed immediately and. what is wrong in particular with the russian filmmaking industry. the reporter has twisted my words a bit the quote is not accurate. or has changed it i was referring exclusively to the way funds are distributed in the morgan film industry if the government finances film production as a not as a type of culture i emphasize no type of commercial special attention should be paid to the issue of fun distribution the way funds are distributed to days totally unacceptable those funds are basically pocketed by a few people in moscow. to a film funded not foster film production growth there has been only

a couple of ws in the country and all last year's films the films that were produced after the reform after the responsibility for fun distribution was taken away from the ministry of culture so bad that no t.v. channel even channel one that is known for favoring commercial films will ever show that the way funds are being distributed is nothing but embezzle meant simple. you have been working in the west a lot so can you point out a country that could become a model for russia the united states germany or france. really good but excessively bureaucratized i remember german t.v. reporters asking me in venice why my film was not financed from german funds among others which. i told the procedure is too complicated in germany you have to go from province to province collecting those contributions into. fifty thousand euros

here twenty thousand years there the french model could feed the russian system best of all. the french have a transparent and democratic procedure for applying for government support followed by an equally transparent and democratic discussion of strong and weak sides of the film project the director is seeking government funds for we used to have something very similar at the time when the russian minister of culture managed fund distribution then the system was changed. to have certain drawbacks of course but anyway it has been abandoned. he was transferred to a group of i don't know whose but has been going on from bad to worse ever since we must introduce an absolutely transparent form of it because it is absolutely necessary it is necessary wherever government funds are distributed. is needed to accomplish this is integrity and decency integrity and decency that's all nothing

else but i think russia is now facing a severe lack of integrity and decency. you have quite a lot with the authorities for some time now. prime minister to see. film from. why can't be privatized he said because there are no decent people left who can manage to. react to your request in any way. it will be clear and simple the management model that have evolved had been privatized would have led to a situation where. a vast country we the people clearly predisposed towards cinematography. we might have no administrative talent but we have a great talent for cinematography and sciences we are great writers and great

composers but the liquidation of landfill have led to monopoly russia we only have to studios left. and the russian world studios. where directors who did not fit into the static and humanitarian of those studios. and artistic environment should present as many creative haven't as many production opportunities as possible. and that is what makes a good artistic environment. studios we have. their small independent artists who would be able to realize their creative ideas but. i would never be able to direct anything. the russians.

have never produced my foster. directors especially young directors need as many alternatives as they can have most young directors would not be able to take off the russian. film. but we do need landfill. because we need a humanitarian studio proceeds. i. would say i'm. not getting a response in russia. you see the films are not screened in russia and probably never will be. i don't. but that's the essence of it how do you explain the difference. public treats you with is it the way film distribution works or does it have to do with viewers becoming less cultured in general.

i have to say first and foremost the cultural landscape in russia has been changing ever since social and political changes began in our society. i would say that every level in society is the same as it was in nineteen twenty nine hundred thirty . compared to the soviet period it is a sign that society on the whole has degraded this is my opinion. the kind of films i make and not just me there are other very notable directors in russia but films of this sort have always been watched by university students specialists and educated classes in general. russian students are in a very difficult situation of these days. it is essentially an environment devoid of humanitarian values. the number of specialists has greatly diminished as most of the factories and research centers have been shut down most of those people are

interested in culture and life in general some of them have other interests now culture is really struggling these days everywhere and the old world i'm not talking about the united states. there is a real battle going on between consumerism and. humanitarian by. it is a real. it is happening in russia as well. of course there is no national distribution. it is no wonder that distributed by one or two western owned companies there is no independent distribution and. national all municipal distribution system like they have in germany for example i do not see to merging in the near future either. there is no room for me in the system but i think room should be made since i make most of my films both documentaries and fiction with government funds. to present my films to the audience

a taxpayer should see where their money goes. this is the general situation and it should be changed. can be changed. by the response your films have attracted to. say that the chill level of the american people is not much higher than that in more than russia. but the general cultural level of the population is higher than in russia unfortunately you know as a citizen of russia i am saying this with a heavy heart i think this is one of the principal. inflected. in the sphere of culture and. of course the cultural level in the us is higher and they have alternative ways of self-expression and systems of distribution.

do you think these losses were natural and inevitable when such a huge leap to capitalism was performed. unavoidable when societies restructured or not. this is a very important question i think partially inevitable but they're also very much the result of the revolutionary changes which have brought russia to the state it is in today being led to minded mainly by humanists intellectuals by scholars who left the field they had belonged to and with drew attention and effort which impair the development of humanities and arts the quality of work in these fields the right moment to prevent trouble was missed today we're trying to catch up with what was lost back then the struggle for leading today is an example of that we were

able to persuade the prime minister that we should not snap decisions on issues of privatization and this is encouraging he chose we should continue winning back what was lost in the past the russian capitalism can't be trusted that it is an old creature with only a stomach and. no heart or head whatsoever we just don't see all these organs how can we trust these beasts semi beast. to cage and digest everything it gets we have to be careful culture must be a priority you should always come first culture is the ultimate goal of a nation's existence they can be no other goals but culture development it is not only true for russia it is true for all the other nations europeans are facing same problems as russia and all the recessions and deadlocks both social and economic can be traced back to the oblivion the cultural sphere has fallen in all right last

question if you call yourself a literature person but what often happens these days is say when my son i ask him . and he says i watched a movie. i watched a movie this tendency to produce screen version so bad because it steals the. view. well that's a very important question and it's cinema source sport that's something that touches is very cool because there is no way there can be serious cinema without literature the only thing i can see is that the purpose of my work when i make films based on some profound literature sources is to inspire the viewers to go and read the book after they have watched the film thank you very much for being with us and just a reminder that my guest today was alexander award winning russian filmmaker with joining me from st petersburg and that's all for now from our spotlight. until then stay on russia today and take.

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berlin is german lawmakers gear up to a vote on boosting euro zone balog funds to rescue a struggling economy. being what athens the coding is correct to wait and find out if this is going to get the better that money is they desperately need for it runs out of cash. a car bomb blast in russia's north caucasus region killed eight people including a young girl. is the latest in a string of attacks targeting police to says when innocent civilians say getting caught in the crossfire join me in last few minutes for the details.