and. this is archie coming to you live from moscow to headline. damascus planes arms terrorist groups for escalating violence ahead of these these five deadline while they you are going down to the arena for two progress in the times that says dozens of president arafat supporters rallied the capital and marking their brooding parties the sixty fifth anniversary of. carre security forces pride down on protesters firing tear gas and water and that was marching in support of anti government sponsored by the man and it's facing

a life sentence has been on hunger strike pussy amounts now and is being treated in the military itself. and sanctions to much of the knowledge self declared ministry did step down in the face of international pressure only two weeks up to see the power and agreed to return the country to prosecution along in return be variations of west african aid was promised to lift trade winds and ground honesty to the military. and other back at the top of the hour with an extended news bulletin for united states russian prisoner returned from thurman to a filmmaker. go on take that sandwich give it to him and standby. we'll go over it he's seen a couple of times film director. issues the new movie about prison life he has won several top prizes a film festivals that yes that's it the film director and his actors have no

expectation of public recognition or fame all they really want is to get away from this dismal scenery as soon as possible and never return but that's it thank you they call everybody. the film crews artistic freedom is confined to this high security jail petersburg. the actor's camera man and director all serving sentences the serious crime. roll call finished return to your area. i'm right you'll toss that snowball from here. film studio is run by inmates in russian colonies a not just for fun the aim is to rehabilitate prisoners their involvement in filmmaking is meant to help them reform and start a new life

a basic camera is the only piece of equipment at the disposal of the prison producers the crew is normally made up of inmates who know how to handle video recording this colony is lucky there is a professional film director serving his term among them. i mean it comes completely against the will one american leader once said the thinking is the hardest word theory a small meeting or a board which is probably the reason why so few engage in it and. has anyone who has been involved in filmmaking at least once and you will tell you need to put up with that it's a very exhausting job people. will play what people in the straightforward bagus lines they have in

a school and you will all fare questionable existence they will be some people skip the. bowl ring it is that there's a teacher's six overeem family is lovely and letters from sanish to france the smell of skim a from the bed to click the receipt like you. would a leg say and the last movie forgive me won an award as an international contests a film about prism of the dirt so became something of a t.v. personality right. now as a film is not a but a prison camp and a v.h.s. it's a film about treachery love and human integrity i mean yes eternal truths that stay alive inside and outside prison which will come across as of course we can't physically make a film about anything but prison life but i'm still not with him so that's a different story and sure there were missing. when the prison authorities realize the film directors work so to improve the quality is image they began to take his

work seriously last year. i'd like to have two shooting areas it's anxious ok i'll talk to the chief of the operation section hopefully he can help us aside from that is everything going according to plan yes valarie cheval of the man in charge of education at the colony is also the chief producer of and all of the movies it is he who make sure the film is shot in this high security camp don't push the limits of what is permitted all members of the crew get together in the colonies clubhouse they want to discuss a new script and congratulate the film director on his success of the film festival and the role of is proud to show off the top prize a gold plated watch or russia's ombudsman collected the prize on our behalf the chief warden gave me the watch and said here is the watch i'm drawing of what

others can't wear such watches but you can inmates are not allowed to keep things made of precious metals here. when he was starting and thrown off had a hard time in persuading prisoners to act in his movies they'd only do it for t.v. and cigarettes at the meeting the director gives a last piece of advice before filming begins. i've heard it if you thought studious careen play. whether it will criminals or law abiding people we are all god's creatures. murderers rapists and drug traffickers make up the bulk of the inmates here each has been sentenced to at least eighty years in prison . has already served five years he was charged with murder after a drunken fight. pleaded guilty he would have only been sentenced to six years instead of ten but he denied the charges in court maybe because he truly did

not intend to kill anyone or that he hoped to avoid punishment altogether. ninety percent of those who find themselves behind bars try to deny their guilt avoid punishment all of them say they aren't guilty each inmate has a story that as a rule has little in common with the official verdict what you tell each other the films they make a clear cut they contain a plain message about good and evil friend and truth and. funding a woman for a female role in an email colony is a problem but they make an exception for if necessary and easily for even a child take part in his films. have changed i knew. for the better. and i would say mature. yes changed.

i miss you terribly i mean looking for what happened. yes and no injury and you can't marry. ever. ever. is one of the the rules state that she is not to communicate with the inmates but she is ready to risk it because of her love of. the city and it from gary has held the psychological barrier between me and them i only pee in civilian clothes on the days when i shouldn't like now i'm not tiring so much my kept and that's even then i realize that i attract attention. ok let's see if everything is alright from this angle. is the male lead in a new movie he has agreed to take part because of the film's parallels with his life. yuri is serving

a sentence for murder he spent six years behind with another six to go. by the current. come in. my name is alex see my name is a killer. i have a son too he was four years old when i was in prison just. now he is ten we haven't seen each other in well it'll be exactly five years on the first of march. as national blog would after i got into prison my wife often visited me here she would bring me parcels. with us. combat lasted for two years but then she told me she was seeing another man. will objecting to that would have been stupid on my part she was young and i had

another eleven years to serve and why should i make her suffer. how old are you. eight. the purple still. on the saddest thing is that i owe a debt to my parents i couldn't attend their funerals since my father died the day after the verdict was announced my mother followed him half a year later it's a shame i didn't accompany them on their final journey i feel so close that my wife has left me but i still have a long term love to serve are the least of my worries. every inmate dreams about the great hollywood romance is shown in film but in reality nobody ever comes to see either inmates or unthought of alexia's even turn down an offer of lloyd's cutie he is merited by his prison filmmaking under such rules inmates are entitled to extra visits from relatives

a more possibles seedling i don't care about visits he can issue that i see no point in them. yes wives are allowed to spend more time with their house plants. but i'm not officially married us kim. i have no mother no father no grandmother and no grandfather. who would ever come to me. and almost twenty two year old son was born by his first wife he lives in a russian city far from here and he never comes to see his father sometimes and dawn of talks with him over the phone which requires special permission. it's my fault and them with us when i left them our turn was just a little boy over the human voice of that age need a father more than anything else like us. alexei's daughter victoria is eight years old she was born elsewhere wedlock victoria and her mother

living saint petersburg they have never come here to see alexei he abandoned them when his daughter was a year and a half old. looks a decided to break those bones she told me she wasn't ready to take responsibility for the child she said the prospect was too much for him it's against him enormously the thought that his life would be entirely changed on bearable i said to him. in the tory. as for me i wanted to prove her family some may not care about their relationships not being formalized but i do very much. the stamp on our passports testifying to our marriage would have meant a lot to me was what is and us said ok but sometimes that's how we parted. after that he got carried away.

this is what victoria wrote on a postcard she sent to her father happy valentine's day adding papa i love you very much. and soon valentine's day inmates get together for a poetry recital. on the obvious. the polling. on the. oh. i think sunday presides over the meeting nickname he's been generally acclaimed as the best poet in the camp is twenty years of life in prison and produced twenty

three thick notebooks of poetry there are thousands of verses about love here woodstock we can still link to people then you should be publishing was like it should pick it up and see it you might expect to make. it usually works let's see if you're serious because you know what alexander leone off killed seven people in cold blood one of his victims was a woman. well for the future of science technology innovation all the latest developments from around russia we've got the future covered.

alexander leo could hardly be described as a positive character but film director thought of could not have found someone with a more conflicted history for his first documentary alexander is a camp legend has crossed poles with the man in charge of the colonies education department valarie shovel off several times both are found themselves in the same high security prisons shovel of as a prison administrator. as an inmate. b.h. some i first saw him a long time ago all of the it was back when i was serving in a high security jail in the urals. is a strong will to. force someone to survive in a russian jail and ensure all the movements from place to place without cracking is

nothing to sneeze at. you i have applied for parole the law allows me to do that. i have already served nineteen years out of the total term of twenty five years i was thirty six years old when i was arrested moved now i'm almost fifty five which still. here the footage is from a legacy a documentary entitled the point of no return as all of his. this is the one from the convicted director shot in the hope that people on the other side of the fence would see the main question of the film is addressed to society do they want his fellow inmate leo off to be set free head of toy. with the question he's asked in the film is alexander imagine yourself walking around town and coming across you're

a victim's relatives what would be your reaction. when frankly talking about this here is pointless i can only hope that they wouldn't recognize me after so many years i would rather avoid an encounter with them and make sure i never cross their paths. each morning alexander goes through a set of exercises of the car in that special forces to perfect their skills he is a paratrooper by training the on off learn to kill during the war in angola he was discharged from the armed forces he went on to make short work of his enemies in the same cold manner the make claims he eliminated business partners who had betrayed him. and the post-mortem said the woman had died of a sixty asian i put her to sleep so to speak and if you press some points on the human next person will pass out never to wake up again. of what he says is not

true. at all of preferred a free wheeling lifestyle. he never sought employment and instead took part in drinking pouts with shady characters. and it's not that he murdered people as a result of a brawl was simply he and his drinking companions would make friends with someone and drink with him at his place and then kill him there was a layoff was given the death penalty for his killings he strangled most of his victims of the scar. was condemned to die but he was on death row for just two years before president yeltsin introduced a moratorium on capital punishment in one hundred ninety six. fellow inmates said to me alexander it seems to us that you get life imprisonment i prayed and went to face my fate and when i entered the room and was told i was now in for twenty five

years instead of getting the death sentence i felt like i had been reborn and i had been stuck in prison for six years by them so another twenty five years was just a trifle with them. but we wanted to meet relatives of his victims and show to them what sort of personally all of us have become a. question is whether an inmate can reform here is a man with nineteen years of confinement behind a man writing poetry demonstrating loyalty to the administration and abiding by the law. man doing all he can to prove that he deserves police from here. but then he already saw an act of humanity when his sentence was changed now he wants another help the right thing to do. i'm still in two minds that's why we wanted to meet the relatives of his victims to ask them. but the plan didn't come to pass

therefore i've been telling undrawn of that his film is incomplete. which. the court turned down the on off peak for parole now he has to serve another five years to whittle away the time he acts in films as working on a role in the world of sport auction. there hark you. look around the tea room. each day some one thousand five hundred combat. come here to the colby's industrial section see timber. and make plumbing fittings including all souvenirs. all of it will be in for you tomorrow outside the prison. most of those who do the hard physical work here see filmmaking is a way of shirking the routine labor of the pope society. they maintain that the public outside these fences takes little interest in films about prison life. a lot

of concedes that his movies and norms must he says like. the girl well i wouldn't go so far as to describe it as a live action film you know it's just fooling around and it's all there is to. cheap special effects don't help his cause for instance in a lexus movie go the only friend of the main character is a talking cat. and you're a. was. it's me your cat chan so much. like the show i run in while here. i see are scared of your own shadow chandran shouts on my dear cat.

this young man works sound engineer at a small theater in some. he could in his twenty nine years old he left high security prison only a year ago to six years since he had been sentenced to eight and of a few years for drug trafficking while in prison where he's with a major prize winning film is one of the main factors that led to his early release . to happen for you know it was prison that paved the way to this theater to be more exact it was a lot. and so that's why i did not been for the film we made together and i wouldn't be here now that's for sure with the bill but with the film festival was chaired by the theatres artistic director he liked our film and gave his business card saying give me a call when you get out of there it so happened that i was the first to get out. was the camera man and production skills he learned in prison his new drug his

ambition was to make movies. but filming costs money and fully realizing his talent is still beyond his means. making a film in prison wasn't much of a problem for you guys didn't need much brought him to motivate them they were only too willing to accept t.v. in cigarettes as pay. nowadays all the people working with director alex am a quite young his new camera man is twenty three years old i was the same age when he was put behind us both fellows were convicted for the same crying drug trafficking. cuban rapper leo days is yet another man serving a sentence for drug crimes. asked him to compose a soundtrack for his new film the convicted film director going off doesn't care

much about whether anybody outside needs his films he hopes that his films help leo and other young men learn new skills when they are released the director's wish is that they realize they are stronger more worthwhile things in this life than drugs . i yearn for the day when i'm released on parole and in the last. there are still three years two months to go i thought. you know i want to return home so very much. so i work hard and try to be on my best behavior here much as if i were to come to think of it the two years i spent in this call only of taught me to manage my time properly in marshal service i've also been learning new skills from the other inmates the soldiers that people here know how to teach them. my son he's

a successful teaching. one zero told my wife and me i know what the junto saying yeah it's all good if i mean drugs and all that stuff we're going to war from for the meaning of business and she said. i trust him so much i can't imagine him doing anything wrong and more i feel the same way i think cartoon want to fall into the trap. is come to realize that he was a bad father to his children he left them with their mother at a time when they needed a father most of all he'll be fifty when he is set free in five years' time of that he will have to earn his children's love again. she was a self-sufficient person who live in a trouble free life. i think he has since taken a long hard look at his life. sometimes they don't reach people to make them

realize that time is running out. still that my son was the see me when i left. the gosh i need to do so much to chop. wood this prison term. i missed so much. alexia off receives his first guest in four years. said lola his college mate brings him a gift he treasures most of all memories three hours creep away unnoticed as they recall highlights of a call each day going to the seaside during the holidays and cutting close to watch

new films. alexy decides to send the watch he won for his film forgive me to his. there's a new batch of conflict. that you got bookmarked one two. i. i. i i i

i i i i i i i i. home. mom.