In what is now the third protest to hit the Cannes red carpet during the festival, a group of Ukrainian filmmakers called out the Russian “genocide” in their country and challenged the world to not look away.
Filmmakers from the movie “Butterfly Vision” on Wednesday on the steps of the Grand Palais theater held a banner that read, “Russians kill Ukrainians. Do you find it offensive and disturbing to talk about this genocide?” Those involved also held up transparent squares in front of their faces that showed the online symbol of an eye with a slash through it, which on social media or the web generally warns of disturbing content that you must opt in to see. The filmmakers also wore T-shirts with the same message during their photocall ahead of the film.
“Butterfly Vision,” which premiered on Wednesday in the Un Certain Regard section and is directed by Maksym Nakonechnyi, is a Ukrainian film about a female soldier who after months of captivity in prison finds that she’s pregnant after being raped by her brutal prison guard.
Nakonechnyi appeared on the red carpet with his producers Darya Bassel and Yelizaveta Smit, as well as lead actor Rita Burkovska. Bassel is a Ukrainian film producer who spoke with TheWrap hours after having fled Kyiv the day the Russian bombings began in Ukraine in February. You can read her account here.
Earlier in the festival, an unplanned demonstration disrupted the red carpet for George Miller’s film “Three Thousand Years of Longing” when a topless, screaming woman wearing body paint of the Ukraine flag was escorted off the red carpet.
But there’s been additional backlash over Cannes booking the competition title “Tchaikovsky’s Wife” from a Russian director and backed by a Russian oligarch, Roman Abramovich.