Welcome to Chechnya

David France | USA | 2020 | Unclassified 15+

As a journalist, David France has spent the entirety of his forty-year career documenting LBGTQIA+ issues, from Catholic sexual abuse scandals in the US to his award-winning coverage of gay persecution in Iraq. Informed by his own lived experience, his expertise as a journalist elevates his work as a filmmaker by combining traditional tools like primary sourcing with modern ones like deepfake technology. It’s the latter that adds such a vital wrinkle to France’s latest film Welcome To Chechnya, which looks at the organised genocide of gay citizens within the Russian Republic. As rumours start to spread of a “gay purge” happening in Chechnya with everyone from everyday citizens to famous pop stars like Zelim Bakaev disappearing, activists race against time to smuggle people out of the country.   

 

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