Chance for an Oscar
On June 6 the Ukrainian Academy of Arts and the Board of the Ministry for Culture and the Arts held a joint session and signed a protocol on nominating Oles Sanin’s film Mamai for an Oscar, Korrespondent (www.korrespondent.net) reports. Nomination for this most prestigious cinema prize requires fulfilling a number of conditions. Mamai, the first Ukrainian movie made with a new sound technology, has already been cleared by the technical commission and enlisted the mandatory recommendations from three US Motion Pictures Academy members. The film’s producers have concluded an agreement with US distributors, also a must for the prize, the Ministry of Culture and the Arts website (www.mincult.gov.ua) points out. The Day asked experts the following question:
Does the Ukrainian film have a chance to win an Oscar?
Mykola MAZIAR, director, Department of Cinema, Ministry of Culture and the Arts of Ukraine:
“Yes, of course.” The first Ukrainian film has finally been made using contemporary sound recording technology. The film Mamai, directed by Oles Sanin, can compete well for an Oscar from the standpoint of both content and its creative and technical qualities.”
Serhiy MASLOBOISHCHIKOV, film director:
“Why not? Can’t a Ukrainian film take an Oscar? Moreover, I think Oles Sanin’s movie is a nice calling card for the Ukrainian cinema. But the point is that any Oscar involves all sorts of games. It is a very prestigious trophy, and the Oscar committee comes under a massive attack, so that the prize is awarded to a film that represents a certain company: both money and influence come into play. I don’t think Ukraine has much chance in this respect because it is a rather poor state. But if we presume that Mamai will still be able to win an Oscar, it’ll happen thanks to Oles Sanin’s talent.”
Yury MAKAROV, TV journalist (1+1):
“As far as I know, the Oscar rules require that the contesting films should have been in general nationwide release, As I have not yet seen Sanin’s film (and I try not to miss what is going on in the Ukrainian cinema), this in any case means that the film was never released. Accordingly, we have to switch this talk from the practical to the theoretical plane. So can a Ukrainian film win the Oscar? In theory, it can, as can the film of any director from any country of Asia, Africa, or Latin America. In practice, I don’t think it will. For the Oscar is not a sign of the excellence of an individual film director, it’s a sign of a nation’s cinema, it means that the latter is developing as part of some very important worldwide tendencies or, even more, is creating these worldwide tendencies in the cinema. What is going on in the Ukrainian cinema just shows that the latter (if we assume it exists at all) is trailing behind all the others. Even Sanin (I’ve seen some of his film clips and photos and heard the opinion of people whom in principle I respect and believe) addresses a historical subject that requires an astronomical budget, which we don’t have, and a related industry (I stress the word industry), which we don’t have either. For example, the Chinese cinema — which has quite successfully produced a string of historical costume films — is a very powerful industry. In Ukraine, even if you find money and decide to form a film crew to make just a simple movie, you won’t find any specialists. Somebody has retired, somebody has lost his skills, some specialties are outdated (because the past 10-15 years, after which we lost our own movie industry, have seen a technological revolution). The directors who could, in principle, deliver the goods have already gone to Moscow or Saint Petersburg to make Russian crime series. So I want to ask a rhetorical question: who’ll win the Oscar? Sanin is, in my opinion, a very talented director (as far as I can judge by his previous works), but in principle for an Oscar this is not enough.”
