Igor Minaev is a filmmaker born in Karkhov, living in France since 1988. In 2019, he released a documentary Cacophonie du Dombass. This film was rebroadcast at the Semaphore this Wednesday, March 30, in order to raise funds to help the victims of the war in Ukraine. Invited on this occasion, Igor Minaev gives an interview to Midi Libre.
Does your film allow us to understand the current war in Ukraine a little?
I hope. He talks about propaganda. This is very serious. Before you take territory, you have to take people’s minds. Propaganda has always worked. At the time (when the film was released, editor’s note) this war was not planned. When we see what is happening today, we wonder why we did not look at it more carefully. There was still a conflict in Donbass since 2014. The most important thing is that this film is seen differently today. But I think the time for reflection will come later. Today is the time to end the war.
Did you imagine, during filming, that there would be such a war?
This invasion was unimaginable. February 24 is a date when the world changed completely. It won’t be like before. Donbass is an epicentre, where a conflict has become war.
Did Ukraine have a central place in the USSR?
It has always had an important place. It was a breadbasket of the USSR, it is the breadbasket of Europe today. It is very fertile land.
You yourself had left this country, which at that time was part of the USSR…
Because I wanted to be free. I worked at the Odessa studio, I went back there a year later (his departure for France, editor’s note) for my film Rez de chaussée. In the USSR, the State is the sole owner of the media, of the cinema… It was very complicated not only for me, for everyone.
And when you returned to Ukraine, once it became independent, what about?
Completely different. It is a country that has experienced many revolutions. When I returned to Ukraine after independence, there was no censorship. It was still a huge change.