Projects launched to integrate people with disabilities into the film industry
Inclusive projects launched to integrate people with disabilities into the film industry
27.08.2024
Article published on the ASI website
Two initiatives were announced at the Koroche film festival held in Kaliningrad on 25 August by the producer, Igor Mishin: Inclusive Cinema and the Without Borders film schools, organised by director Yulia Saponova and producer Oleg Lyubaev respectively.
Saponova explained that Inclusive Cinema is a film school in which 12 professional actors with Down Syndrome work and where discussions also take place on working with artists with various forms of disability on topics such as:
- The selection of actors with disabilities for films;
- Providing support during filming;
- Taking part in impact campaigning;
- Voice-overs and discussions on promoting films starring disabled people;
- Organising masterclasses on the topic of people with disabilities in the film industry for both fellow professionals and a wide target audience.
The project’s immediate plans include working with the Volga film distribution company to voice the main characters with mental illness in the French Film, A Little Something Extra, and collaboration with Alex Ageev’s acting agency PlusSeven.
For the last eight years, Oleg Lyubaev’s film school Without Borders has been offering free professional training for people with disabilities to work behind the scenes in the following areas:
- Film director;
- Screenwriter;
- The skills of a professional photographer;
- Editing;
- Film management (coming soon).
“In our film school, we say that being “disabled” is no barrier to being a highly skilled professional performer”, said Lyubaev.
At the new season’s festival on online cinema to be held on 10 September, KION will be showing the premiere of a full-length romantic comedy film, Sea for Two, performed by the Without Borders film school, directed by Vladimir Rudak, a graduate from the film school and produced by Oleg Lyubaev and Igor Mishin. Among the cast will be Artem Silin and Maria Bystrova from the Inclusive Cinema project.
People with disabilities will be able to enrol for a Professional Photography Skills course at the Without Borders film school until 10 September. The course will last for twelve months, with classes held once a week at the Preodolenie Centre and is free of charge.
