Film and Media Studies Program

On November 17th, the Film and Media Studies Program, the Women's International Media Foundation (IWMF) and the Doyle Film and Culture Series hosted renowned documentary filmmaker, Marina Goldovskaya to screen her new work, 'A Bitter Taste of Freedom (2011)'. This screening was the innagural screening of the Doyle series partnership.

A Bitter Taste of Freedom  is a profoundly moving documentary, a portrait of Anna Politkovskaya, a Russian journalist and human rights activist who was murdered in 2006 for her opposition to the Chechen conflict and the Russian government. Politkovskaya survived multiple threats to her life including being poisoned, held in detention in Chechnya where she witnessed false executions, and numerous death threats. Despite these instances she remained on the frontlines, determined to expose government corruption and human rights violations. Her work would inspire a new generation of Russian journalists and her life story can embolden us all.  A Bitter Taste of Freedom refrences Goldovskaya's earlier film A Taste of Freedom, also a portrait of Politkovskaya, but pre-assisination, and reflects upon how the viewer now repositions their understanding of her life through this extremely personal lense.  Politkovskaya image becomes itself a memento mori.

Goldovskaya has made more than thirty-three documentary films. Utilizing a 'personal diary' style of documentary filmmaking her intimate portraits weave together past and present social histories.  She received a Ph.D. in Fine Arts in the Moscow State Film Institute (1987), and taught documentary  in Moscow State University (1966-1995). She has written many articles and six books on documentary filmmaking. Her lastbook, “A Woman with a Movie Camera”, was published in  2002.