Welcome to Chechnya (2020)
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Welcome to Chechnya Movie Review
Welcome to Chechnya is a 2020 documentary film directed by David France. It’s a typically modern, but an important take on a very urgent subject matter.
The film is about the anti-gay purges happening in Chechnya in the late 2010s. It interviews various LGBT refugees from this area about their horrendous experiences. So yes, literally a gay purge is happening in this region that is basically a country within the country. Russia isn’t gay friendly in the least, but it’s far better than this of course Muslim-populated region.
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My main issue with the movie is that it doesn’t really explore Chechnya. It doesn’t give us enough context into this whole country and its set of rules, only a couple of basics, and the rest is up to the audience to investigate afterward. That was a problem for me as documentaries are supposed to give you many facts and teach you about the subject matter that they follow. This one mostly failed at that.
That’s because it centered on that by now familiar modern take on a documentary, meaning that it tries to be a thriller and not just a documentary feature. I’ve had a problem with that as I find that approach overdone by now, but there is no denying its success at the thriller elements as many scenes here are actually quite intense and you feel for the people’s desperation to escape from this horrible place, leading to the escape scenes being both suspenseful and emotionally cathartic.
Welcome to Chechnya is also stupendously shot, very well directed and also featuring many terrific interviews, especially of note are the glimpses into the relationships between these gay people, and I wanted more of those more human moments. The final act featured a couple of truly special, romantic scenes that really proposed love as a battle against hate.
The director, David France, opted for a very different approach to not feature these people wearing masks or being in shadows. He still protected their identity, but through the means of special effects. I wouldn’t have gone by that route personally, but I still respected the filmmakers for mostly pulling it off stupendously as the effect looks splendid and very believable. It is bound to be influential for other documentaries in that technical area. Let’s just hope that it also manages to inspire change and a stronger reaction from the world when it comes to this horrible place.
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Welcome to Chechnya offers a tragic, intense and important look into the atrocious gay purges happening in this questionable region. The film needed to have more facts in it and it is overly modern in approach, but that still mostly worked as the thriller elements are successfully executed, many scenes here are very suspenseful and moving, and the movie’s use of VFX is very strong and unique.
