by Valerio Cappelli
Hazanavicius Film will open the festival. But the protest comes from Kyiv
Change the title of this movie. First Grit at the Cannes Film Festival. The Ukraine Institute, which represents culture in the world of the country attacked by Russia, asks the festival to change the title of the film opening the review, Z (Comme Z) by director Michel Hazanivicius.
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The reason for the dispute: Zrimanda on the symbol attached to Putin’s tanks. The film is about zombies and of course the title was decided before the war. But the director-general of the Ukrainian Institute, Volodymir Sheiko, a conductor, says: “We believe changing the title would be a gesture against the barbarism, violence and terror of the Russian army. And the head of the cinema of this institution, Natalie Movshovych, says that the local media have already used the film’s title and published articles that could be summarized as follows: See? you support us Therefore, action is demanded from the artistic director of the Cannes Film Festival Thierry Frmaux and the director on behalf of all the victims of the Kyiv, Mariupol and Kharkiv regions.
The international title of the film Final Cut, but the French one was recorded in Cannes. Hazanavicius replied: I called my film Z (Comme Z) because it’s a zombie comedy and it’s inspired by what we in France call the Z-series or the B-series in America. Knowing that this title has brought distress to the Ukrainian people makes me helpless and very sad because it’s the last thing I wanted to do. It must be said that there is no definitive answer to the use of the letter Z by Putin’s soldiers: according to some, the Z (which does not exist in the Cyrillic alphabet) would stand for Za pobedy, that is, victory, for others it could on Zapad , West point out.
The letter from the Ukrainian Institute also questions the decision to include Russian director Kirill Serebrennikov’s film Tchaikovsky’s Wife in the competition. The dissident director, who was under house arrest in Moscow for appropriating funds for the theater he runs, was used by many as an excuse to stop his works against power. Putin hid behind the impossibility of influencing the independent judiciary. Subsequently, Serebrennikov was sentenced to three years probation and a fine, but the Moscow court overturned the sentence and allowed him to leave Russia. In 2018 his film Leto could not go to Cannes: his empty chair became the symbol of this edition.
The new film, Variety magazine reports, was backed by private film fund Kinoprime with $100 million from Roman Abramovich, the Russian oligarch who has returned to Western sanctions on Russian millionaires; Abramovich, who is working on negotiations between Russians and Ukrainians, has had to put his London football club Chelsea up for sale. For Ukrainian producer Denis Ivanov, not the right time for red carpets for our Russian colleagues.
April 24, 2022 (Change April 24, 2022 | 18:04)
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