Rotten tomatoes for a new documentary film about the war in Ukraine

The leader of the far-right “SERB” movement has reportedly filed a police report against “Polet Puli” (Flight of the Bullet), arguing that the documentary film about a controversial volunteer battalion in Ukraine is guilty of inciting ethnic hatred. This past weekend, the film was screened at Moscow’s “ArtDokFest” festival, where SERB activists interrupted and prevented Sunday’s showing. Vitaly Mansky, the director of the film festival, says the activists are judging the movie without even having seen it.

Beata Bubenec’s “Polet Puli” was filmed in war-torn eastern Ukraine in August 2014. On December 10, SERB activists disrupted the movie’s second showing by blocking the screen, splashing the room with a foul-smelling substance, and threatening the audience. Police arrested the men, but the festival’s organizers cancelled the screening out of concerns about public safety.

It’s not only Russian nationalists who have criticized Bubenec’s film. Sergey Khazov-Cassia, a reporter for Radio Liberty in Moscow, pointed out on Saturday that her movie includes footage of a civilian taken hostage by Ukrainian “Anti-Terrorist Operation” volunteers.

In the film, the man reveals his name, address, and passport information, while informing the armed men of separatist locations and vulnerabilities. The volunteers told him that Bubenec was filming a “tactical video,” not a documentary film, and she never got his permission to interview him. In a Facebook post after Khazov-Cassia’s criticism, Bubenec wrote that she was told the man later died.