Director

Sergei Loznitsa

Netherlands, Lithuania | 2019 | 135 min | Russian, with English Subtitles

• Producer Sergei Loznitsa, Maria Choustova
• Production Company Atoms & Void, Studio Uljana KIm
• Screenplay Sergei Loznitsa
• Cinematography
• Editing Danielius Kokanauskis
• Sound Vladimir Golovnitski
• Cast
• Contacts

  Atoms & Void

  contact@atomsvoid.com

About the Film

What makes a country’s leader great? The answer may not always be a benevolent personality and great global policies, according to Ukrainian filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa.

In his latest film State Funeral, a documentary about Joseph Stalin’s legacy, and focusing on the death of the Russian dictator on March 5, 1953—as well as the elaborate ceremony performed to lay him to rest—Loznitsa tells a spellbinding story that brings the viewer into the action as both a participant and a witness. It is not often that we become part of history while watching a film, and somehow Loznitsa allows that to happen. Perhaps we could begin to change our story through it.

Assembled entirely of archival footage that has never been seen before, Loznitsa delves into the cult of personality of Stalin and tries to find answers as to why, despite his many faults as both a man and a leader, there are still thousands of people who gather at his grave each year, on the anniversary of his death.

Skilled filmmaker that he is, Loznitsa manages to hold up a mirror to society with his epic film, pointing to our current state of politics and our choice of world leaders, but also our own complicity in the mass decisions that allowed some of the world’s most dangerous dictators in the 20th century to rule, conquer and destroy.

E. Nina Rothe