The New Russian Documentary, edited by Anastasia Kostina and Masha Shpolberg, offers a rich, timely exploration of a cinematic movement that thrived for three decades before being abruptly curtailed by Russia’s tightening authoritarianism and war in Ukraine. The introduction reads as both intellectual roadmap and elegy: charting the vibrant, inventive, and politically charged revival of Russian documentary cinema since the 1990s while acknowledging that this chapter in film history is now closed.

The editors situate this revival within a long historical arc, tracing influences from Soviet avant-garde pioneers Dziga Vertov and Esfir Shub, through the poetic documentaries of the 1960s, to the radical experiments of the post-Soviet era: from Viktor Kossakovskii’s Belovy, Sergei Dvortsevoi’s Bread Day, and Pavel Kostomarov’s Mother, to the founding of institutions such as Marina Razbezhkina’s School and the growth of festivals like ArtDocFest and Flahertiana. One of the book’s notable strengths is its nuanced approach to identity and terminology. Rejecting reductive labels such as “post-Soviet” or “Putin’s Russia,” Kostina and Shpolberg foreground the porous, contested nature of “Russian” cinema, including works by non-Russian directors engaging critically with Russian history, society, and empire. This openness allows for a more honest engagement with the movement’s diverse voices.

The introduction also highlights the theoretical ferment that accompanied the revival: manifestos by Vitalii Manskii and Aleksandr Rastorguev, debates over “real” and “natural” cinema, and the enduring tension between aesthetic innovation and political urgency. The editors frame the volume around the idea of “documentary filmmaking as a means of taking responsibility for our shared world” (13). Part I, “Contesting State Narratives,” opens with Jeremy Hicks on the weak political engagement of Russian documentaries. He links the dominance of the observational mode to post-Soviet skepticism toward leftist politics and a desire to distance filmmaking from Soviet legacies. Anastasia Kriachko Røren examines the thematic and stylistic features of state-funded TV documentaries, noting their formulaic use of authoritative voice-over and repetitive nation-building tropes (I would rather call them empire-building tropes), such as “the great past” and “the leader and the nation.” Greg Dolgopolov closes the section with an analysis of Aleksei Navalʹnyi A Palace for Putin (2021), focusing on its blend of expository/objective and performative/subjective modes that helped make it a viral political phenomenon.

Part II, “Politicizing History,” examines how documentaries mine the past to address the present. Justin Wilmes discusses Vitalii Manskii’s trilogy—Under the Sun (2015), Putin’s Witnesses (2018), and Gorbachev. Heaven (2020)—exploring the films’ shared concerns about the erosion of democratic values in Putin’s Russia, and analyzing Manskii’s use of allegory, irony, and a realist-interventionalist style. Masha Shpolberg traces Yury Dud’s evolution from celebrity interviewer to director of feature-length documentaries such as Kolyma—Birthplace of Our Fear (2019), noting his generational reach, neoliberal leanings, and controversial reception in Ukraine. Daria Shembel and Lilya Kaganovsky focus on archival and found-footage documentaries that resist fixed historical narratives. Shembel examines micro- and macro-histories in Mansky’s Private Chronicles. Monologue (1999), Dmitii Avrorin’s HardDrive (2019), and Stasiia Grankovskaiia’s Stasya is me (2020). Kaganovsky analyzes Sergei Loznitsa’s compilation films in the context of early Soviet avant-garde “cinema truth” practices.

Part III, “Advocating for the Vulnerable,” turns to social-issue documentaries. Viktoria Belopolskaya reflects on the career trajectories of talented women documentarians who have moved into fiction or left filmmaking altogether. Lora Maslenitsna examines Children 404 (2014) by Askold Kurov and Pavel Loparev, on the experiences of LGBT youth after the 2013 “gay propaganda” law, highlighting both the strategies of resistance and the constraints on visibility. Anna Tropnikova offers a sensitive reading of Iryna Tsilyk’s 2020 The Earth Is Blue as an Orange (set in the war-torn Donbas before the full-scale invasion) and Hanna Polak’s 2015 Something Better to Come (set in a garbage dump), emphasizing how both films avoid victimizing their young subjects, instead foregrounding agency and creativity. Raymond De Luca provocatively pairs Kossakovskii’s Gunda (2020) with Loznitsa’s Blockade (2006) to explore notions of “edibility” and human–animal solidarity: the former asking us to “imagine animals as more than meat,” the latter compelling us to “see ourselves as meat” (194).

Part IV, “Developing Distinctive Approaches,” focuses on individual filmmakers. Anastasia Kostina examines Marina Razbezhkina’s dual role as teacher and producer, and her strict commitment to horizontal, observational filmmaking that largely avoids overt political topics. Raisa Sidenova analyzes Alina Rudnitskaya’s work through feminist and aesthetic lenses, probing the tension between political content and observational form. Anna Nieman delves into Aleksandr Rastorguev’s manifestos and confrontational style, which demands empathy while disrupting cinematic conventions. Jeremi Szaniawski closes the volume with an analysis of Aleksandr Sokurov’s two late documentaries—Reading from the Book of the Blockade (2009) and Francofonia (2015)—the former upholding the Great Patriotic War narrative, the latter unwittingly exposing deep fractures between Russia and the west.

Rich in insight and diverse in methodologies, The New Russian Documentary is essential reading for film scholars, cultural historians, and anyone seeking to understand both the rise and dismantling of independent Russian documentary cinema. While the invasion of Ukraine and subsequent repression have crushed this sphere, the editors resist nostalgia, framing the book as both a historical record and a call to preserve the knowledge, tactics, and spirit of resistance embodied in these films.