Marusya Syroechkovskaya is a Moscow-born award-winning filmmaker and visible artist who needed to flee Russia in March 2022 because the crackdown on opposition voices elevated. Her pupil quick movie, “Exploration of Confinement,” obtained a Jury Award on the 2013 New Orleans Film Festival and certified for the 2013 Academy Awards. Syroechkovskaya is also a 2015 Nipkow Programm Fellow.
“How to Save a Dead Friend” is screening on the 2022 DOC NYC movie pageant, which is operating from November 9-27.
W&H: Describe the movie for us in your individual phrases.
MS: A boy saves his girlfriend from killing herself however neither of them can save him. “How to Save a Dead Friend” is a couple of love that stays sturdy by means of the years, regardless of oppressive and repressive regimes, regardless of depressions and addictions. It’s a movie a couple of love that’s stronger than dying. And it’s a private story that I’ve been filming for 12 years.
W&H: What drew you to this story?
MS: Since it’s so private, the story was simply consuming me from the within and I needed to inform it. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have been in a position to go on. There had been so many issues in my life I couldn’t discuss earlier than. I didn’t have the language nor the voice. This movie is a method of discovering my voice to inform my story.
W&H: What would you like folks to consider after they watch the movie?
MS: I hope audiences will see that I’ve saved a reminiscence of Kimi – my finest pal, husband, and protagonist. I didn’t need his voice to be misplaced and gone. I imagine that you’re not gone so long as folks keep in mind you.
I hope audiences will acknowledge the early warning indicators of self-destruction – it doesn’t must be habit, it may be melancholy, it may be not seeing the trail forward of you that appears open. I believe the movie can contact lots of people.
Also, once I was rising up as a depressed teenager who didn’t know she had melancholy, I felt severely remoted from the remainder of the world. Depression is an isolating sickness. I hope my movie helps break this isolation, even just a little bit. I hope it helps people who find themselves going by means of one thing related really feel they don’t seem to be alone.
W&H: What was the largest problem in making the movie?
MS: It was exhausting to think about myself as a personality within the movie. I’m normally the individual behind the digital camera, not in entrance of it. So, getting this distance between me as a director and me as one of many protagonists was troublesome. But once I acquired it, it felt therapeutic and helped me in my grieving course of.
Another problem was that many of the materials got here from my private archives, with footage shot on completely different cameras, with completely different codecs, and with completely different frames per second. How do you discover a cohesive language for footage spanning 12 years, footage that wasn’t supposed to be a part of a movie when it was shot?
I needed to offer the sensation of what it was wish to develop up within the ‘00s, to dive into sunny summer time days by means of a kaleidoscope of codecs, pulsating visuals, and sounds coming from all instructions. It was undoubtedly a problem, not just for me and the editor but in addition for the post-production workforce. The picture post-production workforce developed a particular AI algorithm that upscaled among the footage as a result of it was shot on VHS and a few small digital cameras from the early ‘00s, with a really small body decision.
W&H: How did you get your movie funded? Share some insights into how you bought the movie made.
MS: We knew from the beginning that we couldn’t – and didn’t wish to – finance this movie in Russia. We didn’t need any affect from the state’s movie fund our bodies nor did we would like any censorship. The incapacity to finance this venture in our personal nation, the place the story occurred, made the manufacturing course of much more difficult. It is an unlucky future that many impartial filmmakers from Russia are actually dealing with.
Due to such circumstances, co-producing was a part of our plan from the beginning. What helped us discover our companions was Eurodoc, a workshop and coaching program in inventive documentary manufacturing. Through them, we discovered our Swedish producer Mario Adamson; our Norwegian co-producer Anita Norfolk, who labored with Mario on his earlier venture; in addition to our French co-producer Alexandre Cornu. Eurodoc additionally linked us to our German co-producing companions Arte and RBB.
All in all, “How to Save a Dead Friend” is a Swedish-French-Norwegian-German manufacturing, with funding from nationwide movie institutes. It remains to be finally a commentary on Russian life.
W&H: What impressed you to turn out to be a filmmaker?
MS: When I used to be a teen, the digital camera was my coping mechanism. I didn’t know the best way to talk my emotions, the best way to discuss my melancholy, nor the best way to ask for assist. My digital camera helped me make sense of this world and have become my communication device. There was one other side in regards to the movie medium that at all times fascinated me – the chance to maintain folks, locations, and music you like in a single area. Film captures time. I misplaced a few of my pals to suicide, however they’re nonetheless alive within the movies I took of them.
And there was one movie that enormously impressed me: “Nowhere” by Gregg Araki, which I watched once I was 16. It was virtually a non secular expertise for me.
W&H: What’s the most effective and worst recommendation you’ve obtained?
MS: The finest recommendation is frequent data, however it’s at all times good to repeat it every now and then: at all times, at all times backup your materials on not less than three completely different exhausting drives. If you might have a backup on a cloud someplace, that’s even higher! Doing so dramatically reduces anxiousness in your life, helps your psychological well being, and retains your materials secure.
I attempted exhausting, however I couldn’t keep in mind the worst recommendation. Maybe the one from my ex once I was getting ready to shoot my first quick movie. He stated, “You can’t jump over your own head.” Ouch! So right here comes one other bit of excellent outdated recommendation: life’s too quick to spend it on individuals who don’t imagine in you.
W&H: What recommendation do you might have for different girls administrators?
MS: Look into your self. Look for a narrative nobody can inform however you.
W&H: Name your favourite woman-directed movie and why.
MS: It adjustments each different day however as we speak, my favourite is “Raw” by Julia Ducournau. It’s touching, daring, and never afraid to cross the road, with some darkish humor. And deeply feminist. A really inspirational movie.
W&H: What, if any, tasks do you suppose storytellers must confront the tumult on the planet, from the pandemic to the lack of abortion rights and systemic violence?
MS: I don’t suppose movies can cease wars, sadly, however movies can break the cycle of isolation and alter folks’s opinions and minds. To quote Kathleen McInnis, “And this, as far as I can tell, is how we start slowly but surely shifting our perspectives to live in someone else’s shoes, even for a moment. It’s how and where we learn to question authority, build empathy, and discover both sameness and uniqueness. It’s where our first glimmer of understanding starts to make its way into our conscience, into our being.”
W&H: The movie trade has an extended historical past of underrepresenting folks of colour onscreen and behind the scenes and reinforcing – and creating – destructive stereotypes. What actions do you suppose have to be taken to make Hollywood and/or the doc world extra inclusive?
MS: We usually see how Hollywood productions are plugging in a single or two BIPOC characters to extend range, however the story nonetheless facilities round white folks. It’s necessary to have BIPOC writers on the workforce and among the many crew to create relatable tales.
Also, there must be extra funding and monetary assist for BIPOC administrators and writers, particularly those engaged on debut movies. The first movie is the hardest to finance.