Krakow FF: Far Eastern Golgotha by Julia Sergina
https://businessdoceurope.com/krakow-ff-far-eastern-golgotha-by-julia-sergina/
Geoffrey MacnabJune 4, 2021 at 2:01 pm
Young Russian filmmaker Julia Sergina first came across Viktor Toroptsev, the very colourful subject of her filmFar Eastern Golgotha(screening this week in the Krakow Documentary Competition), when she saw one of his rants on YouTube. Viktor was a taxi driver from a decaying, depressed city in the far east of Russia. He had started vlogging, holding forth about political corruption and the grim oppressed lives of ordinary citizens like himself.
The director realised at once that Viktor was charismatic, outspoken and unusual. “I felt there could be some story around this character,” she remembers.
The first step was to call him up. His phone number was available through his social media pages. There followed an epic eight hour conversation during which Sergina and Viktor decided they would work together on the documentary.
Viktor’s home town was not far from Vladivistok. Sergina (who was making the documentary as her graduation project at VGIK) shot over an initial period of two months. She didn’t have enough money to complete the film. She therefore applied to the Ministry of Culture for a grant in order to shoot the extra material needed.
There was an obvious irony here. Viktor offers scorching criticism of President Vladimir Putin and his corrupt regime. He has been arrested and persecuted by the authorities and yet here was the government investing in a film about him.
“Many people ask the same question,” the director responds when asked how she managed to secure public funding for a film so critical of the authorities. In her application for financing, she downplayed the political slant of the film, concentrating instead on Viktor’s character.
When the film was screened recently at the Moscow Film Festival, audiences were taken by surprise. This was an irreverent, outspoken documentary, full of energy and attitude. Viewers, Sergina suggests, experienced a sense of “cultural shock” while watching it, in a “good way.”
Golgotha was the site where Jesus was crucified. As the use of the name in the title suggests, Viktor suffered his own form of contemporary martyrdom. The authorities didn’t like what he was saying at all and did everything they could to shut him up. He was briefly imprisoned. His health suffered. Even today, although he is no longer active politically, there is still legal action pending against him – and the threat of a far longer prison sentence.
“All the team is going to help him to find a good lawyer,” Sergina says.
As the documentary shows, Sergei Furgal, one of the few provincial governors in Viktor’s region brave enough to speak out against the regime, was arrested in brutal fashion. He remains languishing behind bars.
The filmmakers themselves say they haven’t come under any pressure from the authorities. “We are a very big country. Very few people saw this film,” Sergina explains why they have been left alone.
During shooting, Sergina and Viktor became “real friends.” He behaved like a father figure to the young filmmaker and they still Skype each other regularly. He was also delighted by the exposure the film has given him, telling the filmmakers that he was very grateful that “I got a part in history.”
In the documentary, Sergina shows Victor in various difficult situations. At one stage, when he is out trying to find scrap metal, his truck gets stuck in the snow. The camera observes him but the filmmakers don’t intervene to help him.
“You cannot see it in the film but, behind the camera, we always regularly helped Viktor and his family,” the director points out. She and her team provided the vlogger with money and food. “Unfortunately, Viktor is a character who likes destroying himself and nobody can stop him,” she notes.
The relationship with his wife and children was more straightforward. The wife was initially reluctant to have their apartment filmed because it was in such a bad state of disrepair. However, she and Julia soon found together what the director calls “women’s solidarity.”
Along with fellow students Sergina is one of the co-founders of the new documentary film studio Staya.Doc but hasn’t yet decided what her next project will be. After her experiences on this documentary, she explains, she is “dead tired” and needs times to recharge.
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