Khodorkovsky is a striking new documentary produced by a German film director Cyril Tushi. He has been gathering material and filming over five years in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kaluga, Chita, Strasbourg, Berlin, New York, Tel Aviv and London — all while overcoming incredible resistance from all sides.
Tushi faced persistent difficulties with financing (one of the German funds, for example, refused him sponsorship with an honest statement: “We fear the Russian embassy will be unhappy and we will have a problem“) and the inability to obtain any material from official Russian authorities (his letters and appeals were simply ignored). Most troubling was that almost nobody wanted to talk to him. Neither the authorities, nor Khodorkovsky allies.
Cyril Tuschi working on 'Khodorkovsky'
In the end, despite the fact that this film obviously lacks many of the most important figures from both camps, Tushi managed to create a convincing document. This film does not draw Khodorkovsky as a saint, nor as a criminal, but it gives a complicated portrait of a man who lived according to the wild rules of his time, and then decided to change the status quo.
As Tushi puts it himself: “Everyone and anyone has something to say about him. Khodorkovsky’s career has been one of dramatic highs and lows – and the hard fall he has taken measures up to any Shakespearean tragedy. This film looks beyond his demonisation through Putin’s propaganda – but also beyond his idealisation as a mere victim”.