Is Ukrainian Oscar nominee illegitimate?

The Tribe, the first Ukrainian film which enjoys colossal international success, has won many prizes, in particular, the awards at the Cannes Film Festival, which has a cult status in professional environment, goes on a long-awaited general release.

Unfortunately, the release was overshadowed by an ambiguous decision of the Ukrainian Oscar committee, to nominate for the Academy Award in the category Best Foreign Language Film the historical movie by Oles Sanin, The Leader, which has seemingly worse starting position for entering the competition list of the Academy Awards (which is significant award by itself) for a number of reasons, mainly because of a non-transparent voting procedure.

We asked director of The Tribe Myroslav SLABOSHPYTSKY, producer Denys IVANOV, and one of the Oscar Committee experts, cinema critic Volodymyr VOITENKO, to comment on the situation.

Myroslav SLABOSHPYTSKY:

“At first I would like to dispel several falsehoods. First, they say I’m criticizing The Leader. No, I’m not. I haven’t seen this film, which is why I can’t criticize it. I have known Sanin since 2000, we have normal relations. Second, they say that The Leader has more chances to win an Oscar, because it is a large-scale and genre picture. But we are speaking about the categories allotted by the American Film Academy namely for auteur, festival films from different countries. As a rule, three films that win in Berlin, Cannes, and Venice plus two more get into the final list. Why does The Tribe stand more chances? Because The Oscars is not a film festival. This is a branch award, where the film is assessed by Americans. Not Ukrainians, Russians, or Latvians, but namely Americans. So, Americans should like the film. The Tribe was highly appraised by American and international publications, such as Hollywood Reporter and Variety. The Tribe premiered at the Toronto Festival. This festival is the beginning of the Oscars race; late Roger Ebert considered it to be the second important festival after the Cannes Festival. Toronto is the place where Europe presents its cinema production for the North American market. To take part in the Academy Awards competition, you should go to Toronto – this is one of the conditions. The Tribe enjoyed there immense success; there were positive reviews in press: everything can be found on the Internet. On the whole, we have a lot of festival prizes. The Leader has taken part only in two festivals, Odesa and Warsaw. By the way, we are taking part in the Warsaw festival as well.

A SCENE FROM THE LEADER

“What will go next? There will be a scandal. It’s very bad that culture is underestimated in Ukraine, because such a story turns into political news: Ukraine was disqualified for corruption, and it is not me who inspires such news. Twenty-five countries, from Europe to the US to Japan have bought The Tribe and, having analyzed the market and judging by the international success of the film, they assume that it will be nominated and very likely wins an Oscar. This is working for Ukraine and international distribution. And in 25 countries the distributors are stupefied. They cannot understand what reasons other than success there can be to nominate the film. One American distributor has written to me, ‘Are they mad?’ People from other countries are writing almost the same things. They ask me, ‘Why?’ Then they tell the press why. As a result we have, I repeat, political news: Ukraine is disqualified for corruption. We seem to have a new power, new life, we are fighting corruption, and this is what we have. This is how it looks like.”

Denys IVANOV:

“There should be trust to experts and the procedure. I had a feeling of seeing something very provincial. The voting was supposed to be secretive. Everyone knows how it looks like, everyone has been to elections: there are ballots, after everyone fills them in separately, the head of commission opens the box and counts the votes. But we have seen here four experts, two of whom were direct contractors of our rivals, and the rest voted on the phone or on the Internet. This is very outrageous. We perceive everything that is going on with The Tribe today like open doors that may close for Ukraine very quickly. We understand that this success is unique, and not every country can have it. But everything is destroyed by the fact that there must be at least eight members of commission, and only six or seven voted, and we don’t see protocols, only four experts at the end, with two of them, I repeat, being the contractors of the rival film. This seems unacceptable for us. Therefore we have sent official letters to the Ukrainian Oscar Committee, to the Ukrainian State Film Agency, the Ministry of Culture. Hopefully, those who are economically related to the film will be excluded from the jury and there will be not four or six people who vote in an odd manner, but 15 full-fledged experts – a maximum number recommended by the Academy Awards to guarantee the resolution will be objective and protected from corruption – and include producers, directors, cameramen, festival organizers, i.e., people able to give a professional and unbiased judgment. The question is not about winning, but the way everything is done. And this is a wrong way. They tell us to wash our dirty linen at home. In my opinion, this dirty linen should be exposed, otherwise our home will be terribly dirty and we will always shoot mediocre films. We simply demand transparency. It is hard to consider this year’s nomination as anything transparent.”

Myroslav SLABOSHPYTSKY:

“Of course, our proposal envisages withdrawing The Leader and formation of a new commission. This can be done before October 1. It is not too late.”

Volodymyr VOITENKO:

“Unfortunately, we had doubts concerning the legitimacy of the approved decision. If part of the experts is related to one of the three nominated films, this is a threat to voting. Apparently, more attention must be paid to these moments.

“I have a great respect to all the directors who have taken part in the        competition. We can think on who    has more chances to enter the shortlist of the American Academy Awards. The Leader has some artistic value and positive features. On the other hand, The Tribe has a serious recognition in the world, which gives certain advantages. The Leader can represent Ukraine, too, but there should be no doubts regarding the legitimacy of approved decisions. Any doubts are followed by a scandalous situation, which is very sad.”

COMMENTARY

“HOW CAN A FILM BE NOMINATED, IF YOU UNDERSTAND THAT IT STANDS NO CHANCES?”

Serhii TRYMBACH, Head of the National Union of Moviemakers of   Ukraine, a member of Ukrainian Oscar Committee:

“Volodymyr Voitenko and I [film critic. – Author] sent an appeal to all members of Ukrainian Oscar Committee with a demand to gather on Monday for a session and seriously discuss the situation. Indeed, it is scandalous, which is why we must thoroughly analyze it. If two members of committee took part in the work on a nominated film at least technically, this is a violation of the selection rules. I  don’t conceal that I voted for The Tribe, and I will explain you the reasons. These two films are in one category of values. Each of them has positive features of its own. However, today The Leader stands practically no chances to be included in the shortlist of the Oscar Prize. Why? It has neither international prizes, nor response; it has not made itself known anywhere. Actually, it has not been screened. Its chances are zero. On the other hand, The Tribe has won prizes at the Cannes Festival and many others. Moreover, almost 30 countries have bought the film for distribution, most importantly the US. It will be reminded that practically all who received Oscar in the category Best Foreign Language Film had an American distributor. Should not this be taken into consideration? Yes. How can we nominate a film when you understand that it stands no chances? All the more so, in a year, The Leader would have won recognition and could be nominated from Ukraine. Legally this is not forbidden.

“On Monday we will gather a committee and make up our mind whether we can cancel the decision. If it’s impossible, the committee must be dissolved. It is acting together with the Association of Producers of Ukraine, which is too much bossing around these days. I have heard that Oleh Fialko is leaving the committee he was heading. He must have voted for The Leader, committed a folly and then left. This is not working. At first, you need to accomplish what you began, solve a scandalous situation, and then leave the committee.”

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On September 11 we found out that Ukrainian film director Oleh FIALKO is leaving the Oscar Committee he was heading. The reason is the scandal around The Tribe and The Leader. Fialko announced this in a commentary to Telekrytyka. “The discussion around The Tribe and The Leader is shocking, both sides have amazing arguments. I have understood that the forest we are living in will die. But will peat emerge instead? Thousands in the front continue to fight for decency. Apparently, for ours, too. Are we worth of it? I’m leaving the Oscar Committee. I am sure more than ever: a dirty lake can’t give way to a clean river,” Fialko commented on his decision.

The Day will continue to follow the situation.