shoot, her husband killed me and his sentence was reduced, the court decided that she swore at her husband, so he killed her, we will not submit to our fate, killers of women, killers of women, in russia, a moment of forbidden intimacy in indonesia, a secret ritual in south africa, three representatives of the film industry speak out against homophobia, but making films on lgbtq topics is always a balancing act on the edge. producer igor mikotin is from russia, director kozi rezal shoots his films in indonesia, actor niza jay lives in the south.

each of them knows that in some countries around the world, lgbtq + people still face extreme forms of discrimination and violence. how far can these three go and what are they risking? today's episode is dedicated to the courage of lgbtq + filmmakers. art in detail. cinema and lgbt+ courage resistance.

it forward, and we move i hope that my films do just that, that they change people on some level, and at the same time entertain them, dreams are one thing, but what is the cost of them embodiment? kozi rezal, director. first, let's meet kozirezal. the director lives and works in indonesia. my goal is to bring indonesian cinema back to its former glory. the word beng chong means gay. but beng chong also means strength. most of my work is about queer culture.

this community is often marginalized in indonesia. my short film makasser - city of football fans is a very personal story. it is about how i perceive my own body, about what it means to be queer in indonesia. oh, you have a big sausage, huh? "like that big, bro, yeah, i love giving the middle finger to toxic masculinity, and to the patriarchy in general, to do it through cinema, it's such a thrill, i just love it, in her debut work, the hostess talked about the pressure that the main character faces, a young man who is afraid to openly admit his homosexuality, i get it, stop pretending"

i've been playing someone else for so many years, it's exhausting, i can't live like this anymore. nisa jay, actor. nisa jay often consciously chooses queer characters. the south african actor has been pushing for such roles and is a role model. he is currently involved in international film and theatre productions. he always knew he wanted to be an actor, this boy is too soft, what brought you here? when i act i am in the moment, i feel like i am leaving my body, like i am transported somewhere else, sometimes it is like a blackout, and it is like a spiritual experience it feels right, like a blessing.

his first film caused a huge stir. here are our children, we are about to perform an initiation rite. his goal is to teach the boys to be men, but in the process he unexpectedly learns something about his mentors. rana is a film about two men who enter into a relationship when they become mentors at an initiation rite for a xhosa boy. it's good to see you, my friend, now we can hang out like old times, but this time when they meet, there is a new participant in the rite,

he's from the city and his presence literally destroys their entire familiar world. sorry, brother, your wife knows what you're doing in the mountains. "run, initiate, in fact, it's a love story about what happens when someone doesn't fit the usual ideas about a man, my character is exactly like that, he doesn't fit into these masculine frameworks, but finds himself in a world where everything is subject to these rules, the film..." opens the curtain on what is usually kept secret in south africa - the initiation ritual. not look son, i'm a man. i'm a man. this is a circumcision ritual that

is performed by the xhosa people. young men aged 16-18 are sent to an isolated place where they are initiated into adulthood. the film rana caused a backlash because people felt that we had revealed a secret sacred ritual that, in fact, should not have been made public. sit, sit, sit there, it's good for your wound, it happened to all of us,

this is how it happens, the film was shown on such famous international festivals as well as berlin, but in the southernmost africa... i was completely unprepared, neither morally nor financially, it was very difficult, i had a hard time getting separated from my family, it was disgusting for me to realize that i found myself in a city where i dreamed of moving on my own terms when i decided,

instead i was suddenly forced to clean other people's houses, tidy up other people's things, in order to somehow earn a living, because there was simply no other work... igor mikotin, producer. in russia, representatives of the lgbt community increasingly becoming a target for discrimination and attacks. producer igor mikotin grew up in remote magadan, about 6.00 km northeast of moscow. he remembers that there was no queer community there. during the stalin era, magadan was the center of the gulag system and served as a transit camp for prisoners, but it was in magadan that igor made his first film as a producer, the award-winning documentary quinddom, kingdom. at the center is history and local queer artist drac queen

jenna marvin. you and i are probably looking at everything from the outside. you and i are getting along just fine today. so i have a tights? being a young gay man in a small town like magadan means not seeing anything that is connected. today igor lives in the us, but he still clearly remembers what his childhood in magadan was like. i thought that someday i would get married, have children, everything would be like everyone else, i kept lying to myself, because there was not a single sign of another reality around. that's why i make such films now. "i want people to be able to immerse themselves in another world, to which

they may not yet belong, look say that it was better, quiet, quiet, that the horizon is level, yeah, that's it. queen's house, kingdom is an exploration of the work of a drag artist. in the image of jena marvin in abataj surreal outfits, she challenges the homophobic policies of the russian authorities. the viewer follows jena from magadan to moscow, where she moves to study. here she fights for the rights of the lgbtq community and openly declares to society about her problems. with incredible courage , she puts herself at risk, attracting more and more subscribers on social networks.

this is an autocracy, where power is concentrated in the hands of a handful of people, it kills the desire to continue living, it kills creativity, it kills everything, russia will be. representatives of the lgbtq plus movement in russia are forced to hide, they cannot show their feelings in any way, because they are threatened with arrests, beatings, murders. the film crew followed dzhena for 4 years. i'm afraid, according to igor, during filming constantly

lawyers were on duty, in case someone was arrested, and the cameraman always rode on roller skates, so that in case of danger he could escape and save the material. in the end, genova was arrested and expelled from the university, she was forced to return home. another interesting fact about gena, we sometimes told her, maybe we shouldn't film this, it's too dangerous, and she always answered, i'll do it anyway with or without you, then we understood, just being next to her is already a kind of. protection. the film ends that jena seeks asylum in france. queendom is a shocking

documentary. it shows the price a queer artist has to pay for his resistance. jena was forced to leave her grandparents who raised her in russia. kozi rezal, director. and we return to kozi rizal from indonesia, who makes fun of homophobia. i grew up in a very conservative muslim family. i remember dancing a lot as a child. "i loved performing on stage, and i danced with the girls, i was the only boy among them, i always had to listen to a lot of rude comments from boys, they called me the n-word, called me a girl and stuff like that, my parents saw that i was in pain, and it was painful, they wanted to stop me,

and i also went to the hairdresser - three times a month, it's crazy, who else does that, but i had to look gorgeous, i had to shine every minute, beautiful, gorgeous. and from my hometown of makassar straight to the prestigious cannes film festival. director kozi rezal reimagines indonesian cinema. in 2023, he made history by becoming the first indonesian director to have a short film compete for the palme d'or. i want to make stories that i have never seen in indonesian

cinema. this film is where kozi's signature style comes into play, caustic and ironic. we have so many islands in indonesia, hundreds of islands, but why do we only see films about jakarta all the time? come on, indonesia is not just jakarta. i want to see films that show people of my hometown. basri, get up, let salma sit down, you're sitting, your wife is standing, that's wrong. fadel, start counting. 3,

2, 1, 2 years ago, i made a film based on a situation that i... experienced at home, my family is very religious, their faith literally drives them, but during dinner, they sometimes suddenly start behaving very vulgarly, they can start discussing sex in such crude, dirty terms, so it's hard to believe, oh, maybe you just can't get it up, maybe your penis is too small, too short for her hole. no, of course, i mean , everything is like a normal family, they sit , eat, talk, they can laugh together, and in a minute it all turns into a real nightmare, lazy ass, what kind of woman are you,

we all know who is a lazy unemployed idiot here, what did you say, fool? hey, come on, stop it, stop it, what did you call me, shut your fucking mouth. this is what i want to show in my film, how toxic masculinity poisons us. it destroys everything and hurts everyone regardless of gender. niza jay, actor. from battle to battle, with extraordinary ease, he has overcome the most oppressive regimes, and he has done it with dignity, when i'm on stage, i feel like the coolest person in the world, i feel like, oh, i just love acting, i think

there's something magical about it, creating something, giving it to the audience, seeing it right away. i feel powerful inside, and other black queer people in south africa want to feel that power too, but those who make decisions often see us as either clowns. or just want to report on their projects diversity, i get boxed in sometimes too but i found a foothold in that because i believe queer people are

magic, we are incredible, we are so many different, so nuanced, so unique, i really want to inspire young black kids who come from the same places i come from to see, here i am, a black person, so they don't feel like they have to settle for less or be a bit part. no, no, no, queer actors can be leads, queer actors can lead franchises. queer actors can be world stars. while remaining true to yourself and your craft. igor mikotin, producer.

while studying in the united states, igor mikotin met a director with whom he would later make his next film. he immediately realized that he would participate in the project as a co-producer. tell me, please, how critical is the situation? the fact is that my uncle found out about my orientation just recently. he will kill me anyway. i was one of the producers of the film "welcome to chechnya." this is a full-length documentary by director david france about the persecution lgbt youth in the chechen republic in russia and the efforts of activists who are trying to save these people and ensure their safety. we have not had such an experience, we need to hide people. we need to find them visas, some secret ways to take them out of the country. in 2017

, there were reports from chechnya that homosexual men and women were taken away, tortured, forced to reveal the names of other members of the community, and then killed or returned to their families, who themselves decided whether to kill or punish them. filming took place in... the people who ran in are in great danger and we couldn't reveal their real names, we replaced their faces and voices using deep fake technology called it deep truth,

deep truth, pull yourself together, put a little, no, it's normal the picture was a big success. it premiered at the sundance film festival. we won a bafta award, an emmy nomination, and were eventually nominated for an oscar in two categories: best feature documentary and visual effects. it was the first documentary in history, shortlisted for visual effects, thanks to the work we did replacing the characters' faces. one of my favorite scenes is toward the end of the film, when the gay couple finally comes out.

telling the stories of their community, their reality, the ones that are rarely told. the films of niza j, igor mikotin and kozi rezal have become beacons of hope for lgbtq communities around the world. i think that's the power of cinema, it's like it makes us better people. it's okay to insist on respectful attitude towards yourself, it's normal. to set your own standards, we queer people just want recognition and freedom.

what's your name? i'm sophia. you're not sophia, dear. no, i, my daughter is different. how is she different? she's smaller than you. i need to know who you were. the woman who became my mother. now i ask myself, maybe i judged you too harshly.

does not forgive traitors, the people do not forgive those who crawled on their knees before the enslavers, who betrayed the seven red army soldiers, my family, when they returned, you are such and such, you are traitors, well go, ask the german, here stalin restored the destroyed economy after the war, at the expense of such slaves, who were not paid a penny. at present, it impartially covers events in the world, in israel, in ukraine. i like the channel at the moment for its plot, that they tell the whole truth, this has never happened to journalists in the back before, i am detained, i trust this channel, i am very glad to see you, that you work, that you exist.

here is an interesting channel that gives, in general, some sufficient information that we will not get from other sources. when putin started a full-scale war against ukraine, i realized that i could no longer be in russia, on the second day, i think, i wrote down a general appeal, war is a time when you can stain your conscience for life, we flew to mexico and gave... crossed the border of the united states asked for political asylum, now here in america i am starting life from scratch, i think, go out, go down, take, 5-10 minutes, that's how i came down at any time, even in the middle of the night, wanted to live on raw potatoes, came down, took the potatoes and lived, they took all the basements, sold them, zheyu or whoever, everything was silent, all this

is a... my last one, i said, if you get it, we will fight, of course, and we will fight, theft is prohibited for any reason, as well as deportation of protected persons from the occupied territory to the territory of the occupying power or to the territory of any other state, regardless of whether they are occupied or not. the occupying power the state will not be able to deport or move part of its own civilian population to the territory it occupies.

the fsb is considering several possible motives for the murder. it was friday, the weather was terrible. we caught a taxi, the radio was on in the car, there is usually news every day. we were driving to the bridge and the driver asked me: why are you going there, no one cares anyway. i answered: well, i don't know.