In August 1991 a failed coup d’état attempt led by a group of hardcore communists in Moscow ended the 70-year rule of the Soviets. The USSR collapsed soon after, and the tricolor of the sovereign Russian Federation flew over the Kremlin. A quarter of a century later, Sergei Loznitsa revisits the dramatic moments of August 1991 and casts an eye on the event which was hailed worldwide as the birth of ‘Russian democracy.’ What really happened in Russia in August 1991? What was the driving force behind the crowds on the Palace Square in Leningrad? Who are these people looking at the camera: victors or victims?
Sergei Loznitsa was born in 1964, in Baranovichi, USSR. He graduated from the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute and the Russian State Institute of Cinematography (VGIK). Since 1996, he has directed 17 award-winning documentary films. His debut feature My Joy was selected for the main competition of the Cannes Film Festival. His second feature film In the Fog won the FIPRESCI Award in Cannes in 2012. In 2013 Sergei founded the ATOMS & VOID film company.
Selected: Blockade (2005), Artel (2006), My Joy (2010), In the Fog (2012), The Letter (2013), Maidan (2014)
