Film ǀ Wash clean with blood – Friday

If we weren’t living in a post-heroic age that criticizes heroes for the fact that there is always something narcissistic about them and that their willingness to make sacrifices is glorified in excess – then you would have to have some of the protagonists Welcome To Chechnya likely to be referred to as such. They are definitely shining examples of humanity, courage and compassion.

This applies to both the LGBTQ activists portrayed in the film and some queer Chechens, whom they enable to escape from the semi-autonomous Russian republic. Arte has given the film the title for broadcast in Germany Caution, danger to life! LGBT Chechnya awarded. Since the wave of persecution against homosexual, bisexual and trans * people that began in 2017 at the latest, it has no longer been possible for them to live safely there. The authorities hunt down gays and lesbians, kidnap them and torture them in order to gain further contacts. Many do not survive the ordeal or are deliberately murdered.

In his documentary, director David France accompanies the risky work of David Isteev and Olga Baranova, who jointly carry out the rescue missions of the “Russian LGBT Network”. They classify the escape scenes shown and provide background information in separately conducted interviews. In addition, refugees who are in secret accommodation in Moscow are portrayed in more detail. There they are waiting for a visa for western states after they have been smuggled out of Chechnya.

Because the refugees continue to be persecuted by the government, but also often by their own relatives, security precautions had to be taken during the shooting. The majority of the victims who had their say were made unrecognizable with the help of a “deepfake” technique. Instead of your own face, you can see that of the volunteers, slipped over them like an inconspicuous, digital second skin. A clever solution that does not dehumanize those affected and does justice to a certain imagery of the mask that gays and lesbians have to wear in a homophobic society.

France explains further measures of the shooting on site in interviews: He pretended to be a tourist and always carried two cell phones with him. While he was turning one smartphone, the other showed photos of sights that he could safely show in the event of an inspection. In tricky situations, hidden cameras or inconspicuous GoPros were used to film.

Against the whole family

The real danger illustrated Welcome to Chechnya through harrowing cutscenes (including dash cam recordings and trophy videos of the perpetrators) that are on the verge of the bearable: While a short scene at the beginning shows two young men who are surrounded and threatened by their tormentors in a wide field at night later, the film fades out before a large, hastily dragged stone smashes the head of a young woman who was previously dragged out of the car by the hair. As David Isteev explains, in the ultra-religious country the whole family is considered to be affected by the “shame” that homosexuality brings with it. A shame that can only be washed away with blood.

The 21-year-old Anya also fears for her life. She contacted the activists by phone; the number reaches those affected through reliable word of mouth. She is forced to have sexual intercourse by her uncle after he learns of her sexual orientation. He blackmailed her into telling her father about it. Since he in turn works for the government, their situation is all the more precarious.

Anya’s rescue mission includes the most nerve-wracking scenes of the overall very thriller documentary. In the capital Grozny, supporters pose as their aunts who want to go shopping with her. They destroy the cell phone. The group is held up at a checkpoint as well as at the airport. There is constant fear that Anya could already be searched for. Although they make it to Eurasia with her, their story does not come to a satisfactory end.

This setback isn’t the only one documented by the film. But as improbable as it seems Welcome to Chechnya is ultimately also a hope-giving film. In view of the omnipresent hatred and the enormous brutality that hovers over the actors as the sword of Damocles, their commitment seems almost larger than life.

In addition to the activists, it is above all a 30-year-old gay man who is initially introduced under the code name “Grisha”, who excels with his enormous courage. He is not a Chechen himself. He reports that he only stayed there to work. Nevertheless, he was so tortured that in the end he could only crawl. When his family searched for him from Russia, he was suddenly released.

The film accompanies him as he flees to an unnamed European country with his closest relatives and his partner. However, he does not feel comfortable in the comparative security. Instead, he was briefly driven back to Russia, where he was the first victim of torture to appear publicly and testify. At the most moving moment in the film, during a press conference in Moscow, the virtual shell slides off his face and he introduces himself with his real name, Maxim Lapunov. Not only because of the explosive nature of the topic, but also because of the spectacular design Welcome to Chechnya an exceptional example of what the documentary genre can do.

The justice that he is demanding has not yet been drawn in. President Ramzan Kadyrov not only denies the acts, but simply the existence of homosexuals in Chechnya. But since the documentation was published, global awareness of the injustice has increased: the Berlin human rights organization “ECCHR” has just joined forces with the “Russian LGBT Network” and high-ranking representatives of the Chechen security apparatus reported to the Attorney General in Karlsruhe about the principle of world law. That too gives hope.