Loktev’s “My Undesirable Friends” Gains Oscar Momentum Amidst Crackdown on Russian Journalism
The documentary My Undesirable Friends: Part I – Last Air in Moscow is building notable momentum as it enters Oscar shortlist voting,recently earning accolades from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association,the Gotham Awards,and the New York Film Critics Circle. Director julia loktev’s film offers a chillingly intimate portrait of independent journalists in Russia as the Kremlin tightened its grip on information and dissent, culminating in the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Loktev, who immigrated to the U.S. from the Soviet Union at age nine, returned to Moscow in 2021 to begin the project. The resulting film, clocking in at five-and-a-half hours, is a stark warning about the fragility of press freedom and the dangers of unchecked authoritarianism. “The law on ‘undesirable organizations’ has been used to silence dissent and criminalize independent voices,” Loktev explains. “It started with human rights organizations, NGOs, educational institutions… The list of undesirable organizations grows every day, as does the list of extremists and terrorists.” This designation effectively criminalized independent journalism and activism.
At the heart of My Undesirable Friends are the stories of Anna Nemzer, a talk show host at TV rain – Russia’s last independent news channel – Ksenia Mironova, a reporter also at TV Rain, and Elena Kostyuchenko, a journalist at Novaya Gazeta who has drawn comparisons to Joan Didion. Loktev emphasizes that the film is fundamentally about these individuals. “It’s about people,” she says. “I’ve made fiction and I’ve made documentaries and I actually just make films about people, where you get to go through something with people that you come to know.”
The film employs a vérité style, observing the journalists as the pressures of censorship intensify. What begins with moments of dark humor gradually transforms into a tense and unsettling portrayal of a profession under siege. Loktev describes the editing process as akin to fiction filmmaking, constructing the narrative through a series of interconnected scenes. Archival footage is used sparingly, primarily to contextualize the journalists’ work and demonstrate the reasons for the Kremlin’s hostility.
The film subtly draws parallels between Putin’s actions and the authoritarian tactics of past Soviet leaders, including the use of repression and the glorification of a problematic past. Loktev notes a disturbing trend of historical revisionism, stating, “Obviously there is again a glorification of stalin… But it is indeed also how authoritarians work. It’s how you tell your history, how you tell your present.” She further points out a similar pattern in the United States, referencing attempts to control the narrative surrounding sensitive historical topics like slavery.
As the documentary progresses, Loktev’s subjects are increasingly branded as enemies of the state, facing severe consequences. “Some of them have been declared terrorists and extremists in Russia,” Loktev reveals. “Some have been convicted in absentia and none of them can work openly in Russia now as over the course of the film, Russia basically shut down all independent journalists and all my characters had to flee the country with a suitcase.”
The film’s length presented a challenge for Oscar eligibility, as the Academy had implemented rules against excessively long documentaries. Loktev recounts having to appeal to the documentary branch’s executive committee to secure a waiver, given the practical difficulties of screening a five-and-a-half-hour film multiple times daily in a conventional theater.
Loktev is already at work on “Part II,” which will follow the exiled journalists as they navigate life and continue thier work in a new diaspora. “Part 2 begins a few days later when they’re just in the first stages of having left with a carry-on [suitcase], their media has been shut down, they have no idea where they’re going, and then they have to get back up on their feet as journalists,” she explains.”It takes place in some 13 countries because people keep moving.” She expresses admiration for their resilience, noting, “I’m endlessly surprised by how people keep working, how people even now in exile, all of them work as independent journalists. How they find the strength to keep going, how you keep fighting when the fight seems lost.”
