The Collective for the Respect of Human Rights is organizing a new film debate around the movie “Mr Nobody against Putin” on Tuesday, May 5th, at the Le Relief cinema in Séléstat.
Talankin Pavel, a Russian employee of the national education system, produced a poignant documentary in 2025 by filming for two years the implementation of the military and nationalist program imposed in schools after the invasion of Ukraine.
From his work in a school in Karabash, a poor mining town in the Ural Mountains, he shows how Putin uses schools to justify the war in Ukraine. When Putin officially launched his “special military operation” in February 2022 to invade Ukraine, disinformation was also put in place.
“This is not the military who win the war”
The teacher took it upon himself to document the militarization of Russian schools and society by filming the indoctrination of his students (his school, like all others in the country, implemented a militaristic program with revised history classes, patriotic songs, and demonstrations of anti-personnel mines orchestrated by Wagner mercenaries).
The message from Putin’s administration is clear: “It is not the military who win the war but the teachers.” Mr Nobody is therefore “an ordinary man,” an ordinary resident of an ordinary town. But this striking dive into the reality of propaganda was made at the risk of the teacher’s life and forced him to flee the country in the fall of 2024 with the hard drives containing his videos.
The documentary directed by Talankin Pavel with American director David Borenstein won the award for best documentary feature at the Oscars ceremony on March 15, 2026.
The one-hour and thirty-minute screening will be followed by a debate with the audience moderated by members of the CIDH and in particular Albin Limousy, who is also a history teacher at Schwilgué high school.
(Note: Film debate about “Mr Nobody against Putin” on Tuesday, May 5th at the Le Relief cinema in Sélestat at 8:00 p.m.)
