{"id":10607,"date":"2019-05-15T21:35:36","date_gmt":"2019-05-15T19:35:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/?p=10607"},"modified":"2019-05-15T21:37:07","modified_gmt":"2019-05-15T19:37:07","slug":"director-of-unpatriotic-movie-says-russia-not-ready-for-truth-about-war-in-afghanistab","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/2019\/05\/director-of-unpatriotic-movie-says-russia-not-ready-for-truth-about-war-in-afghanistab\/","title":{"rendered":"Director of \u2018Unpatriotic\u2019 Movie Says Russia Not Ready for Truth About War in Afghanistan"},"content":{"rendered":"

THE MOSCOW TIMES<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

By Pjotr Sauer<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Director Pavel Lungin.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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Outside the Oktyabr cinema in central Moscow a well-dressed crowd lines the red carpet, waiting to catch a glimpse of acclaimed director Pavel Lungin as he enters the building for the premiere of his latest movie, \u201cBratstvo\u201d (called \u201cLeaving Afghanistan\u201d for distribution abroad).<\/p>\n

But inside the auditorium is half empty because the authorities have closed the roads surrounding the city for a rehearsal of the May 9 military parade celebrating the Soviet Union\u2019s victory over Nazi Germany in 1945.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are trying to block us any way they can,\u201d Lungin jokes as he takes the stage.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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“Bratstvo” depicts the brutality of war.\u00a0 <\/span>WDSSPR<\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
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\u201cBratstvo\u201d (\u201cbrotherhood\u201d), based on the memoirs of Afghan war veteran turned FSB spy chief Nikolai Kovalyov, tells the story of the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989. Its realistic portrayal of the last days of the conflict sparked heated discussion after politicians and war veterans slammed its depiction of Red Army soldiers as unpatriotic. Scenes showing soldiers looting and fighting with each other have been particularly controversial.<\/p>\n

The campaign against the film has been spearheaded by Igor Morozov, an Afghan veteran and deputy chairman of the Federation Council\u2019s Committee on Science, Education and Culture, who has labeled the movie \u201ca harmful film that twists the history of the Afghan war.\u201d<\/p>\n

Morozov is supported by \u201cBattle Brotherhood,\u201d an organization for veterans which has called for the movie to be banned.<\/p>\n

Lungin rejects the criticism.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is an anti-war movie, not an anti-Russia movie. My main aim was to show how good guys are sent to fight ugly, pointless wars,\u201d he told The Moscow Times.<\/p>\n

Lungin added that it is counter-productive to attempt to rewrite the history of the Afghan war.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think our society needs to start opening the wounds of war…whether it\u2019s Afghanistan or Chechnya, as the backlash from this movie shows we\u2019re afraid of talking about the truth that Russia wasn\u2019t always the good guy.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Feb. 15, 2019, marked the 30th anniversary of the Soviet withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan. The nine-year war claimed the lives of more than a million Afghan civilians and over 14,000 Soviet troops.<\/p>\n

At the time, Communist Party Secretary General Mikhail Gorbachev’s decision to withdraw the Soviet military from the country was hailed as a long-overdue end to a bloody conflict and the decision to invade was condemned as a mistake by the Congress of People’s Deputies of the Soviet Union. In recent years, however, some Russian politicians have sought to reframe the war as a patriotic success.<\/p>\n

Movie critic Andrei Arkhangelsky, who called Lungin\u2019s portrayal of war \u201cthe most honest\u201d he has seen in Russian cinema in the last twenty years, said it is this backdrop that has led to the current controversy.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt a time when the state is trying to oversimplify who the \u2018enemy\u2019 is and change the way we understand our history, this movie raises important questions of what patriotism really means. It runs against the black-and-white thinking cultivated in society,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Some Afghan veterans have also come to the defense of Lungin.<\/p>\n

\u201cMorozov does not represent us or other veterans I talked to,\u201d said Valery Shiryayev, a decorated military translator who served in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n

Yesenia Kovalyova, the daughter of Kovalyov, the veteran on whose memoirs the movie is based, said the film\u00a0\u201cwas exactly how my father would have wanted it.\u201d Kovalyov died less than two months before the premiere.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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