Russia’s Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights on Wednesday condemned the Oscar-winning documentary “Mr. Nobody Against Putin” for featuring children without the consent of their parents.
The film, which chronicles the indoctrination of schoolchildren into Russia’s state ideology during the war in Ukraine, was co-directed by Pavel Talankin, a former school videographer in the Chelyabinsk region.
Talankin smuggled the footage he filmed at the school in the town of Karabash when he fled Russia in 2024.
On Sunday, “Mr. Nobody Against Putin” won best documentary at the 2026 Academy Awards.
Russia’s human rights council said that “images of minors were used without obtaining the consent of their parents” in the film.
It added that footage shown in the documentary was meant to serve as an “internal record of school activities for educational use,” but instead was used for commercial purposes.
The human rights council said it had sent a request to the Academy that awards the Oscars and the UN cultural agency UNESCO to launch an investigation.
The Kremlin said this week that it had not seen the film “Mr. Nobody Against Putin” and therefore could not comment on its Oscar win.
AFP contributed reporting.
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