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Exiled Russian filmmaker Zvyagintsev takes aim at Putin's war in Oscar bid
The drama follows a logistics owner forced to choose workers for military service as it becomes one of Zvyagintsev’s most direct antiwar films.
- Exiled Russian filmmaker Andrey Zvyagintsev explores Vladimir Putin's war in Minotaur, a drama about conscription and moral compromise that won the Cannes Film Festival Grand Prix this year and is entered for the 2027 Oscar for best international film.
- Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine transformed the project after Zvyagintsev originally intended to remake Claude Chabrol's 1969 thriller La Femme Infidele. Online mobilisation videos helped shape the screenplay's scenes about conscription.
- The story follows Gleb, a logistics owner pressured to send employees to war; he recruits new drivers instead, dispatching them to the front. Unable to return to Russia after COVID-19, Zvyagintsev filmed using a Latvian town as a stand-in.
- Russian authorities designated Zvyagintsev a 'foreign agent' in August, a label for figures accused of anti-Russian activities with foreign support. Minotaur opens in French cinemas on October 14 but cannot be officially released in Russia due to its subject matter.
- Levada Center polling from 2026 shows support for the military campaign remains above 70%, though 67% of respondents favor peace negotiations. Zvyagintsev describes art as 'soft power' working over the long term but remains skeptical it can quickly shift opinion.
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Exiled Russian filmmaker Zvyagintsev takes aim at Putin's war in Oscar bid
PARIS, Oct 3 (Reuters) - Exiled Russian filmmaker Andrey Zvyagintsev takes on Vladimir Putin's war in Ukraine in "Minotaur", a drama about conscription and moral compromise released nearly five years after Moscow launched its full-scale invasion.
·London, United Kingdom
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