The Central District Court of Chelyabinsk banned the distribution in Russia of the documentary “Mr. Nobody Against Putin.” Mediazona reported this.
According to the case file on the court’s website, the lawsuit was filed by the deputy prosecutor of the Chelyabinsk region, and the regional office of Roskomnadzor is listed as the defendant.
The only participant present at the hearing from the proceedings was Senior Deputy Regional Prosecutor Evgeny Tumshin. He asked the court to restrict access to the film at three addresses on the VK Video, Yandex.кz, and Motion Video services.
According to the claimant, the film’s “content is formed through general militarization,” and it also expresses a “negative attitude toward the special military operation and the current authorities.” In addition, the film’s author, Pavel Talankin, shows a white-blue-white flag on screen, which in Russia is considered a symbol of the Freedom of Russia Legion.
The prosecution called this “propaganda of extremism and terrorism.” A representative of the prosecutor’s office also said that the film shows the faces of schoolchildren without their parents’ consent.
“Mr. Nobody Against Putin” received the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature on March 16. Soon afterward, Putin’s Human Rights Council filed a complaint with the American Film Academy and UNESCO, saying that the film’s authors had used images of minors without obtaining consent from their parents. The council said that in this way the filmmakers had violated children’s rights.
Talankin filmed the documentary at a school in the town of Karabash, where he worked as an activities coordinator. After the war began, the teacher was instructed by the administration to film “patriotic” events, official morning programs, and school assemblies. He later left Russia with the recorded material and handed the footage over to American filmmaker David Borenstein.