Gena Marvin has everything to displease Vladimir Putin’s regime. Queer, Gena Marvin openly demonstrated in the streets of Moscow, in his most extravagant costumes, against the war in Ukraine and in support of Alexeï Navalny, when he was alive…
Gena is also an artist, and her costumes, proudly displayed from the top of her vertiginous heels, imitate a spider or a bare tree, transform into land art, when photographed in the middle of lunar landscapes. Gena loves Russia. This is his country, where his family and friends live. It is also there that the filmmaker Agniia Galdanova followed the artist through his performances and the ups and downs of his personal life, until his arrival in France, where Gena now lives. His film, Queendom, is presented at the International Festival of Films on Art (FIFA).
Repressing her queer identity is not an option for Gena Marvin, who says she acquires omnipotence by donning her costumes and giant heels, defying the wrath of the regime and the army. The film also presents us with previously unseen images of opposition to the war in Ukraine in the streets of Moscow, and of demonstrators, including Gena Marvin, violently dispersed by police forces.
Gena Marvin’s spectacular political positions obviously do not go unnoticed. After his exclusion from an art school, Gena, whose sex assigned at birth was male, must face the obligation to enlist in the Russian army.
Total paranoia
“Since my arrest [à une manifestation contre la guerre], I live in total paranoia. They arrest everyone in the street. In April, registration for the army begins. Joining the army means death for me. I cannot and will not participate in this monstrous war. Thank you for helping me escape my country. I have two weeks left to leave Russia,” the artist wrote in an appeal for help, looking for a visa to leave the country. Gena Marvin will finally find refuge and asylum in Paris.
The Russian authorities have passed a law banning all “LGBTQ+ propaganda”, we are reminded at the end of the film. Gena’s grandmother died six months after the film was made. Her grandfather, who had always criticized her sexual orientation, finally agreed to send her money to Paris to buy high heels.
In the same vein, FIFA presented Monday Pussy Riot, Rage Against Putin, by Denis Sneguirev. “On February 24, 2022, the unthinkable happened. My mother’s country invaded my father’s country,” says the filmmaker at the beginning of the film. The filmmaker then follows in the footsteps of the Pussy Riots, these Russian feminist punk activists who recently returned to the forefront by organizing a huge fundraiser to defend Ukraine. Already, in 2012, these women had contested the election of Vladimir Putin as head of the country, and had expressed themselves freely on Red Square. “We wanted to show people that they can do more than they think,” said one of them. The only way to overthrow the authorities is to break their rules. »