Overview

• The film captures late-2021 to early-2022 repression of independent journalists by shadowing TV Rain reporters through protests, forced “foreign agent” labels, and police intimidation.
• Loktev’s five-and-a-half-hour cinéma vérité approach (shot largely solo on an iPhone) eschews talking-head interviews in favor of intimate, character-driven scenes of work and off-duty moments.
• Following its 2024 premiere at the New York Film Festival, My Undesirable Friends: Part I begins an August 15 run at New York’s Film Forum while seeking broader U.S. distribution.
• Critics and viewers have framed the documentary as a cautionary tale that resonates beyond Russia, with audiences in both authoritarian and democratic societies drawing parallels.
• Loktev is editing a second five-hour installment, Exile, which follows displaced TV Rain journalists across 14 countries as they navigate life after fleeing Russia.