Recently, in a Yerevan museum I heard a museum guide competently and very devotedly introducing the museum\u2019s exhibit when suddenly I overheard the firm statement of an alleged fact that supposedly some film not only was the closing film, but also was awarded one of the main prizes at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival.<\/p>\n
Minutes later, when the tour ended and there were no museum visitors in the vicinity, I approached the museum guide and said that the film in question was screened in the out-of-competition program, which already excludes it from receiving a main prize, notably, the Grand Prix. <\/p>\n
I added that I\u2019m convinced that it likewise could not have been the closing film, but for additional reliability I urged the guide to check the information online (the internet to the rescue).<\/p>\n
To this observation of mine, the museum guide replied very graciously that she feels no need to check the information since her source is more reliable and credible than any website. Already understanding which indisputable source she was referring to but all the same not concealing my surprise, I asked her to explain.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe film\u2019s director told me personally,\u201d she whispered, her palm cupped to my ear, in an ironic and triumphant tone\u2026<\/p>\n
The sincere, devoted to her work, yet naive museum guide couldn\u2019t even imagine what an unreliable source who requires constant checking the creator of a work \u2014 both beginner and famous \u2014 may be.<\/p>\n
For years already, we have come across in the headlines of interviews and news stories the claim \u201cmy film was\/will be screened at Cannes\/Berlin\/Venice\u201d and other similar formulations.<\/p>\n
The majority of both journalists and news consumers accept this information like melted butter, trusting media outlets or, like the museum guide did, the filmmaker, not seeing anything illogical in what was read or reported.<\/p>\n
In fact, everything is logical, since at Cannes Film Festival, for example, there\u2019s a huge film market (March\u00e9 du Film), where each year several thousands of films are shown.<\/p>\n
And since these screenings geographically take place in Cannes, then it turns out that, yes, indeed, \u201cmy film was screened at Cannes this year.\u201d From a linguistic and geographical perspective, it seems, there are no contradictions.<\/p>\n
But clearly we\u2019re dealing with semantic manipulation because there\u2019s \u201cCannes\u201d and then there\u2019s Cannes. <\/p>\n
\u201cOf course, that is not correct. In Cannes, there\u2019s just one official program, which consists of competition and out-of-competition programs. While the rest, Un Certain Regard, Cin\u00e9fondation for short films, International Critics\u2019 Week, and Directors\u2019 Fortnight, though honorable, are non-official programs. For the love of God, you shouldn\u2019t pretend that you participated in the festival if the film was screened in the non-official program. And as much as possible, we must put an end to these myths. The same applies also to participation in other festivals,\u201d famous Russian film critic and permanent Cannes Film Festival visitor Andrei Plakhov explains.<\/p>\n
All this does not mean that we\u2019re not happy for our filmmakers\u2019 efforts and don\u2019t welcome their presence in international film markets or underestimate their importance. <\/p>\n
We want only that journalists and news consumers finally form a clear idea that will allow them to separate films that participate in competition programs from those that are screened at the film market. <\/p>\n
Ultimately, to appear in the competition program, a film goes through an artistic selection comprised of several stages \u2014 unlike non-competition platforms, where to be included it\u2019s enough to make the required payment and ensure that the film meets the technical (not artistic) standards.<\/p>\n
Mikhail Zhvanetsky said: \u201cDo you not know why? A country\u2019s achievements are always in those areas whose reliably is difficult to verify.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fortunately for all of us, technological progress has enabled an excellent opportunity called the Internet to check information. It remains for media literacy to develop in newsrooms \u2014 and among information consumers, a critical approach. <\/p>\n
Karen Avetisyan Recently, in a Yerevan museum I heard a museum guide competently and very devotedly introducing the museum\u2019s exhibit when suddenly I overheard the firm statement of an alleged fact that supposedly some film not only was the closing film, but also was awarded one of the main prizes at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. Minutes Read the full article…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":8583,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[132],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-vox-populi-en","author_posts-karen-avetisyan"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8589\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nJournalist<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"