We talk with Maxim Pozdorovkin, co-director of "Pussy Riot - A Punk Prayer." On February 21, 2012, five members of Pussy Riot staged a 40-second performance of "Punk Prayer - Mother of God, Chase Putin Away!" in a Moscow cathedral. Three members of the group, Nadia, Masha and Katia, were arrested and and convicted in a trial that reverberated around the world. Nadia (Nadezhda Tolokonnikova) and Masha (Maria Alyokhina) remain in prison, serving sentences of two years in remote Russian prison camps.
The film explores how political and religious forces contrived to make an example out of these three young artists who stepped out of line, and shows the international protest movement their actions unleashed. The movie won the World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for "Punk Spirit," at the 2013 Sundance Festival.
Find out more at the movie's Facebook page.
Award-winning actor David Clennon has been one of the few voices in Hollywood to take a stand against torture as promoted by the film "Zero Dark Thirty," which has been nominated for several Oscars.
He also posed the question, "If the deeply racist Birth of a Nation was released today, would we vote to honor it? Would we give an award to Leni Riefenstahl's brilliant pro-Nazi documentary, Triumph of the Will?" David talks about his stand, and why he is speaking out.
Check out his article on Truthout.
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