Alexey Pischulin: "Assume the Mission to Impress!"

14/05/2022 19:00

On May 14, the headquarters of the Eurasian Peoples' Assembly in Moscow (Russia) hosted an international master class on the basics of video and photography for schoolchildren and students involved in capturing historical monuments and objects dedicated to the Second World War and the Great Patriotic War.

The master class was held by film director and screenwriter, winner of the TEFI Award Alexei Pischulin. The audience was guys from Lebanon, Latvia, Moldova, Slovenia, Slovakia, Transnistria, Russia, Estonia and the USA. Many of them took part in the contest “Victory for All!” they sent the videos for the contest.

Contest "Victory for all!" was organized on the eve of the 77th anniversary of the Great Victory and in the year of the 80th anniversary of the beginning of the Battle of Stalingrad (July 17, 1942), which became the beginning of a turning point in the Great Patriotic War and World War II. The mission of the contest is to pay tribute to the memory of the Soviet soldiers who liberated the world from Nazism. The practical goal of the competition is through teaching schoolchildren and students the basics of photography and video filming of Soviet military memorials and the skills of working with electronic data archives (OBD "Memorial", "Memory of the People", "Feat of the People", etc.) creating a video registry of Soviet military burials and memorable places, first of all, on the territory of the Baltic countries, where an inexorable struggle is being waged against historical truth and crimes against humanity without a statute of limitations committed by the Nazis and their accomplices during the Second World War are consigned to oblivion.

The secrets of directing and cameramanship, revealed by Alexey Pischulin, will be useful not only for future directors of historical films, but also for streamers, bloggers, and those who want to tell stories through the camera.

Basically, the master touched upon the technical side of camera shooting and the director's manner of narration. He answered questions about the interesting presentation of archival documents, the need for technical equipment for the director and cameraman. He noted that nowadays a smartphone can serve as a camera for a person who is burning and confident that his video story will change the world. A deep idea will always move a technically verified “emptiness” both in the soul of a simple spectator and in the soul of a professional festival selector.

Alexey Pischulin urged young authors to use ingenuity, cunning, a special approach, convey an image, remember that directing is inventing:

"Assume the  mission to impress!"

The director summed up:

"Each film is your contribution to the history of your country, its present."

And he advised to take professional criticism as an opportunity to improve the next film.

A full recording of the master class is available on the website of the Eurasian Peoples' Assembly.

The event was organized by the Eurasian Peoples' Assembly together with the Russian Intellectual Center in the Republic of Moldova and the Eurasian Academy of Television and Radio under the support of the Presidential Foundation for Cultural Initiatives.