Russian Winter03.01.13 - 03.02.13

MVMT Films (France) and Mirumir Studio (Russia) present:

24 young filmmakers from 15 different countries exploring remote places during winter, taking a fresh look at stereotypes about Russia

6 Short films shot and edited during the project composing a full feature documentary film drawing a new map of the Russian reality.

Rich material for a web-documentary6000 km... by train!

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WHAT IS CINETRAIN?

It all started with a Soviet documentary filmmaker in the 1930’s named Aleksandr Medvedkin, who invented the Cinetrain as a propa-ganda tool. Film crews would travel through the Soviet Union in specially equipped wagons. Although they were filming the industrial achievements of the regime, the underlying goal was to give the power of speech to peo-ple who didn’t normally have the opportunity to get their voices heard. They were shooting and, straight away, edited and screened their movies on the spot to the people that took part in the movies.

THE FIRST TWO PROJECTS The Cinetrain project took place already two times in 2008 and 2010 respectively from Moscow to Vladivostok (“Cinetrain: Where does Europe end?”) and from Bishkek to Moscow, (“Cinetrain: Bishkek-Moscow” )

The movies were presented both individualy and all together in more than 40 festivals and received several international awards among which:

- Semaine de la critique, Cannes 2009. Official selection. - E.F.A. 2010. Short film nominee for Between dreams. - Moscow International Film Festival 2010. Official selection. -Vision du réel 2011. Best directing in a short film for Territories.

Alexandr Medvedkin

The first Cinetrain crew in front of their wagon.

The 2008 team at Cannes film festival The Cinetrain 2010 arriving in Moscow

Cinetrain is a unique creative documentary project. We gather young professional filmmakers from all over the world to partici-pate in a thrilling and extreme filmmaking adventure... By train!

More info on our site: cinetrain.net

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And now the Cinetrain is back for the third time! To resurrect the enthusiastic feeling of Medvedkin’s adventure, we or-ganized of call for participants from all over the world among young cinema professionals. We received more than 200 applications from more than 50 countries. Participants were carefully selected, set up in teams and they will be sent on the road, to shoot and edit short documentary novels on a given theme.

In an industry where puting up a film together from writing to shooting and editing can take years, we offer a complete different and more instinctive approach: creative documentary filmmaking on the move from city to city, edit-ing on the way, the movies having to be screened upon arrival to the final des-tination. The result of the project being a full-length documentary composed of several novels different in form and approach and united by the same enthusi-asm of being part of a unique experience.

Hard working conditions, critical deadlines, unknown places. We be-lieve that challenges stimulate creativity!

The participants of the Russian winter project will visit 6 cities.2

About Stereotypes

It is a fact well known: Russia suffers from a bad image abroad, mainly carried by the Western media. This negative coverage is spread as well by the Russian press, implementing a vicious circle of mistrust.

It’s a common thing for a foreigner in Moscow to see yourself asked: “So? Any bear around here?”: the Russians are convinced that all foreigners imag-ine Russia as a wild wasteland populated by bears hanging around the streets of post industrial devas-tated cities where the population is wearing fur coat in summer and drinking vodka for breakfast...

While not entirely untrue, as a result of that, a foreigner visiting Russia may often come back home not having taken a step out of Moscow, hang-ing around the city in an expensive German car, dancing in fancy European style clubs playing Ameri-can house music, eating, sushi and drinking French Champagne with Russian ladies dressed in design clothes European women would only dream of... Their Russian hosts making a priority to show that Russia isn’t the wild country they could expect, but a “civilized and developed great nation”... Far from understanding anything about Russia, foreign guests will get a wrong idea of a country that has much more to offer than the fancy Moscow life, that one could find in any Western capital.

How to build a cultural identity in this urge to “look like Europe”, and denying traditions? Why Russians seem to be scared to face and laugh at the stereotypes about their country with foreigners?

“Laughing at ourselves as well as with each other gives a surprising sense of togetherness.” ~ Denying the truth in stereotypes is as stupid as limiting a whole nation to them. Germans ARE order freaks, French DO drink a lot of wine and eat frogs, a lot of Americans ARE obese... But of course, they are much more than that! Just like Russians are much more than vodka drinkers, of course, but with-out the vodka drinking, would they still be Russians?Foreign filmmakers investigating the Russian stereo-types isn’t another way of negativly criticizing Rus-sia, but a way to go deeper into the national reality and discover how rich of traditions and human val-ues Russia really is. After all, facing the look of others upon you is the condition to existing. Without the look of others you cannot built your identity. Without seeing your-self in someone else’s eye, you cannot see your flaws and strengths, you cannot improve yourself. CINETRAIN: Russian winter wants to bring everyone together in the celebration of the Russian identity... In laughter!

The theme chosen for this edition of the project and uniting the short novels is “STEREOTYPES”.Here is why:

7 different stereotypes were chosen and will become the subject of 7 short novels. Each team will research the theme beforehand and prepare their movie, with the help of local consultants in every city, shoot and edit their movie on the go. The movies will be presented upon the end of the project.

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Resumesample of work

The fantasies about the Russian woman are deeply rooted in the western mythology about Russia. They are usually seen as gold-diggers searching for a bet-ter life abroad or as elegant and good caring wives. But one thing is sure – they are beautiful! But how do they feel about being seen as such? How do they see them-selves? What is their secret?

THE RUSSIAN WOMAN

The team

SANDHYA SUNDARAM (India)

DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY SOUND DIRECTOR

DAVID LEE (UK) MARCIN KNYZIAK (Poland)

“As a filmmaker, women have been my constant suject, talking about various issues and stereotypes we face in my country, India.”

Resumesample of work

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Whatever the Russians say, bears are everywhere. From the 1980th Olym-pic’s mascot to the logo of presidential party “Russia United” this symbol of power and strength is all over the country. Russians do not like this stereotype, but still they put it everywhere. It’s time to ask the bears how they feel about it.

THE BEAR QUESTION

The team

TRISTAN DAWS (UK)

DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY SOUND DIRECTOR

STEFAN BOOKAS (Germany)

ELENA PETROSYAN (Russia)

“Above all, I value hope in my sto-ries. I want to make films that shine a bright light into dark places, and allow us to see the world with new eyes..”

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“If you haven’t been to banya, you haven’t been in Russia”. It’s the best place to meet the “naked russian soul”: sweaty drunk naked people beating each other with birch branches, and then jumping into ice cold water is a life changing experience. But why do they do it? Can you really enjoy such a treatment?

THE RUSSIAN BATH

The team

FYODOR DRUZIN (Usa / Russia)

DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY SOUND DIRECTOR

LUCA GIBERTI (Italy) TAMAS-FERENC JESZENSKY (Romania)

“In film making as in life I love the thin line between realism and ab-surdity. Ideas must be honest, but their realization imaginative..”

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Vodka is at the same time the biggest pride and the worse curse of Russia. They do drink it a lot... To celebrate a birth or a death, the vodka usualy flows the same! But vodka drinking is a more ritualized social event than you would imagine, and the Russian toast may be the most touching expression of the Russian soul...

MAKING A TOAST

The team

BENNY JABERG (Switzerland)

DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY SOUND DIRECTOR

JOONA PETTERSSON(Finland)

XAVIER THIEULIN (France)

“My movie will show - without prej-udices - that drinkers aren’t always stupid, violent people but mostly on the contrary: people with (too much) sensitivity.”

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It’s no mystery: Russian winter is tough and very very very cold. Still the life doesn’t stop: children go to school, shops are open and restaurants are full even by -30°C. What are the tricks and hints the Russian use to make this extreme part of the year more bearable?

HOW TO MAKE IT THROUGH THE WINTER

The team

CRISTINA PICCHI (Italy)

DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY SOUND DIRECTOR

SAULIUS LUKOSEVICIUS(Lithuania) HENRI D’ARMANCOURT (France)

“The funny, touching or hectic eve-ryday struggle to cope with the climatic harshness of these areas would be counterbalanced with lyr-ical moments in which disembodied thoughts, emotions, memories and hopes would converge in a sympho-ny of voices...“

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What is a Lada on top of a mountain? A miracle. How do you double the price of a Lada? You just have to tank it up. What’s the mystery behind this legendary brand? And more important: who drives these cars and... why?!

THE LADA MYSTERY

The team

DIETER DESARTE (Belgium)

DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY SOUND DIRECTOR

ANNEGRET SACHSE (Germany)

Yulia Glukhova(Russia)

“As a filmmaker my aim is to con-tinuously create documentary films that are intimate, humanistic, thought provoking and considerate towards the people I work with.”

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“You cannot understand Russia with your head, you need to use your heart!”, this stereotype may be the only one Russian people are actualy proud of. But does it really exist or is it a way to flatter its inhabitants by giving them the feeling to be special?.. Because we don’t take the answer “it’s the Russian soul, you cannot un-derstand” as an answer, we need to enquire this question!

THE RUSSIAN SOUL

The team

ROBIN DIMET (France)

DIRECTOR

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

JOHN CRAINE (UK) BERNADETT TUZA-RITTER (Hungary)

“I try to have some humour in all my films, to bring poetry and laugh-ter... I’m interested in imagination, dreams, ethnic and marginal peo-ple, travel and wild nature “

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Uniting the m

ovies

Getting the short films together into one full fea-ture film is a critical part of the project, which we are planning to achieve in 2 possible ways.

The making-of team

OLIVIER JOURDAIN (Belgium)

DIRECTOR DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

MARTON VIZKELETY(Hungary)

DIMITRIS TOLIOS(Greece)

No matter which way we will decide to choose, a complete shoot-ing crew will come along to shoot a stand alone making-of the pro-ject. They are all participants of the previous Cinetrain projects and are familiar with the specific aspects of filmmaking in thoses condi-tions as they went themselves through it!

- Including making-of material between the short movies: HOW the films are made is to us almost as important as the movies themselves. The adven-ture of young filmmakers from different countries, traveling in extreme conditions in 3rd class train wagon on thousands of kilometers in a snow cov-ered landscape is a movie in itself! Giving the audience the feeling of this ad-venture can really add up to the films in different ways: we could introduce each team before each movie by asking them what they expect from the adventure at the beginning of the trip, see them working, watch their movie and then go back to the team at the end of their film to meet them after completing the adventure and they could tell us about how a hard / funny / interesting / mind blowing experience this was and how their opin-ion about Russia changed (or not).

- Having common characters / places through the different short films. We could make the characters of the mov-ies “pass by” each others. For example the main character from the “lada” film could end up drink-ing vodka with friends, and we would smoothly switch from one stereotype to the other... anoth-er team taking over at that moment, leaving one character behind and going with the next one...

Shooting in the train (Cinetrain 2008)

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About Money

About Schedule

- Total budget of the project: - Financed on 10/08/2012:- Sponsorship (expected)- Necessary founds:

150 000€75 000€25 000€50 000€

Our project received a production grant from the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation.

Research and preparation: September-November 2012Pre-production: November-December 2012The project itself: 3/01/13 - 03/02/13Post-production: February 2013 Delivery: 01/03/13

Some 2008 Cinetrain participants editing in the train

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About Us

The Cinetrain: Russian Winter project is co-produced by MiruMir Studio (Russia) and MVMT Films (France)

Guillaume Protsenko - MVMT Films

Guillaume is a French producer and direc-tor. He graduated from the Russian film school (VGIK) in 2010 as a fiction director. By that time he already produced two edi-tions of the Cinetrain project.

Fascinated by Russia he now lives be-tween France and Russia where he is de-veloping different projects between those two countries, both as a director and as a producer.

Tanya Petrik - MiruMir Studio

Tanya Petrik is a Russian producer. She is both experienced in fiction and documen-tary executive production and works for international productions.

Contacts

www.cinetrain.netinfo@cinetrain.nettel: +79263701773

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