Venice Head Alberto Barbera Defends Selection Of Russian Director Ilya Khrzhanovsky’s ‘DAU’: “It Is Not Pro-Putin Propaganda”

Following weeks of criticism from activists and Ukrainian officials, Venice Film Festival director Alberto Barbera defended his selection of Russian filmmaker Ilya Khrzhanovsky’s feature DAU in a lengthy Instagram message posted on Wednesday.  Beginning by describing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as “bloody and cruel”,

Venice Film Festival artistic director Alberto Barbera took to social media on Wednesday to fight back against criticism of the inclusion of Russian filmmaker Ilya Khrzhanovsky’s “DAU” in this year’s edition. Acknowledging the “bloody and cruel war” in Ukraine, Barbera wrote in an Instagram post that “to build a web of