My Undesirable Friends: Part I — Last Air in Moscow
62nd New York Film Festival: Main Slate
History unfolds with on-the-ground immediacy in director Julia Loktev’s first feature since 2011’s The Loneliest Planet, as well as her second nonfiction work after 1998’s Moment of Impact. Running five-and-a-half hours and split into five chapters, My Undesirable Friends: Part I—Last Air in Moscow chronicles the hardscrabble efforts and eventual exile of a group of young Russian journalists who work for the independent news channel TV Rain.
“The world you’re about to see no longer exists,” Loktev narrates in the first scene. For there was no way to know, when filming commenced in 2021, that she would be in a prime position to observe the Vladimir Putin-instigated invasion of Ukraine, in addition to the draconian crackdown that followed on any and all dissenting voices. Not that the situation for reporters refusing to toe the party line was sunshine and moonbeams beforehand. Much of the documentary’s first two chapters revolve around the ridiculous restrictions that Putin’s authoritarian government concocted to keep alternative viewpoints in check.
In the public sphere, Putin and his cronies voice support for independent media. Yet outlets like TV Rain are forced to note, via verbal and textual disclaimers, that they’re “foreign agents” speaking against the purported societal consensus. Crackdowns by police are likely, and protest is sure to be met with bullying resistance at best or systemically sanctioned violence at worst. The absurdities of the situation are so ingrained and all-consuming that the venom-tipped sarcasm of the on-air reporters is evident in everything from their tone to their body language.