After having caused controversy in Venice with his documentary Russians at war, and after seeing its North American premiere postponed in Toronto due to apparent security threats, director Anastasia Trofimova said Tuesday that she still doesn’t understand the political rationale behind the war between Russia and Ukraine.
“The reason I got into this war is to understand the people who are fighting. In terms of looking for political reasons, I don’t know yet,” the Russian-Canadian director said during a post-screening Q&A, defending the fact that the film was shot while Trofimova was embedded in a Russian army battalion in eastern Ukraine.
She was responding to a TIFF viewer who asked if Trofimova had learned anything from her three years of producing Russians at war. “I say, I still don't understand the reasons behind this war. If you understand them, and everything is so clear, I mean, I congratulate you. But I don't know. I really don't know,” Trofimova told the questioner.
People with Ukrainian flags and banners during a demonstration outside TIFF Lightbox on September 17, 2024.
Mert Alper Dervis /Anadolu via Getty Images)
Then, when the same questioner asked her whether Russia was the main reason for the conflict in Central Europe, Trofimova added: “I think there are many other factors involved, yes, they are definitely sending troops to resolve whatever grievances there are. It's not right.”
When the TIFF interviewer thanked Trofimova for her response, the film’s Oscar-nominated producer Cornelia Principe, also on stage at the TIFF Lightbox, expanded on her director’s response. “He said that sending troops to invade the country is not a way to solve a problem, right? That’s what he’s saying,” she told the festival-goer, who again thanked Trofimova for her response.
“You don’t seem to understand,” Trofimova responded from the stage during a tense exchange, at which point Anita Lee, the Toronto Film Festival’s chief programmer, ended the post-screening Q&A.
Ivanka Tymchuk, a member of the Ukrainian-Canadian Congress council, who criticized Russians at war As a propaganda film, during the post-screening Q&A, it was asked whether Trofimova had expressed ignorance about the politics behind the war between Russia and Ukraine.
“The director who has a university degree would have an analytical thinking and would put the pieces of the puzzle together and understand the fact that three provinces of Ukraine are occupied by Russia, which is a violation of international law,” Tymchuk said. The Hollywood Reporter from outside the TIFF Lightbox, where a vigil of about 200 Ukrainian-Canadian protesters was held on Tuesday.
“(Russia's) goal is obvious, to invade as much of Ukraine as possible,” Tymchuk added. A week ago, after an earlier protest over her film in Toronto, Trofimova said DAY Her first-person film took her to talk to ordinary Russian soldiers for seven months in Ukraine, to gain a perspective that no one else, including official Russian TV or Western journalists, had ever managed to capture.
People with Ukrainian flags and banners during a demonstration outside TIFF Lightbox on September 17, 2024.
Mert Alper Dervis /Anadolu via Getty Images)
Toronto Film Festival organizers have rescheduled the North American premiere for Russians at war for September 17, after the 2024 edition ended just days earlier, due to security threats and political heat. During the 2:30 p.m. screening of the film, two Ukrainian activists who were watching the film briefly shouted their opposition as they walked out of the theater.
Their protest in the theater occurred during a scene in which director Trofimova asked a 19-year-old soldier why he denied that war crimes, including the rape and murder of civilians, had been committed by the Russian army and his country.
Protesters, as they made their way to the cinema exits, echoed the Ukrainian government’s claims that more than 100,000 incidents of alleged war crimes, including the murder and torture of civilians, were committed during the conflict. Asked about the protests during the post-screening Q&A, Principe added context not included in the film.
“That scene was to show that he didn't actually know the truth about what was happening. Secondly, it's the same guy who was talking to his girlfriend about her broken nail. I mean, if you take his word for it as the word of the film, obviously not. We all know that war crimes were committed. What she (Trofimova) wanted to find out was whether he knew or thought that war crimes were committed,” Principe said from the stage at TIFF Lightbox.
“A five-year-old could see that this is not a statement of fact for the film. It's a statement of the state of mind of that child who is talking to his girlfriend about his broken toenail,” the film's producer added. The controversy over the film first emerged at the Venice Film Festival, where the film had its world premiere.
People with Ukrainian flags and banners during a demonstration outside TIFF Lightbox on September 17, 2024.
Mert Alper Dervis /Anadolu via Getty Images)
On September 10, about 400 Ukrainian citizens of Toronto gathered outside the TIFF Lightbox to protest a press and industry screening of the film. They held signs reading “Russians at war “It justifies and victimizes murderers and rapists” and “Hello TIFF?! Russian propaganda kills.”
Canadian Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, who is of Ukrainian origin, also expressed concerns about the TIFF screening during a press conference in Ottawa. Russians at war. That political heat and “significant threats to festival operations and public safety,” according to TIFF organizers, helped prompt the cancellation of an official North American premiere for Trofimova’s film during its September 5-15 Toronto run, only to be followed by a swift reinstatement of Russians at war for the TIFF Lightbox screenings on September 17.
The Lunenberg Film Festival in Nova Scotia also features screenings of Russians at war on September 20, while the Windsor Film Festival in Ontario will screen the Canadian-French co-production on October 25 and 26.