Belarusian <a href="https://cinemamix360.com/2026/08/26/film-schools-and-the-future-how-to-plan-for-the-unpredictable/” title=”Film Schools and the Future: How to Plan for the Unpredictable”>filmmaker Andrei Kutsila’s “Letters From the Silenced Country,” a DW, ZDF/Arte and TVP co-production, will have its world premiere at the 83rd Venice International Film Festival – a first for DW.
The film offers a stark portrait of life under repression in Kutsila’s native Belarus. Forced to leave the country after the peaceful protests of 2020, he now lives in exile in Poland. In “Letters From the Silenced Country,” the filmmaker tells the stories of people imprisoned or silenced for criticizing President Alexander Lukashenko, opposing the war in Ukraine or simply demanding to be treated as citizens with a voice. For many, letters offer a rare connection to the outside world.
Among them is Kasia, a young student imprisoned after joining hundreds of thousands of Belarusians who took to the streets following the rigged 2020 presidential election. In detention, she began to draw. Her images – filled with anger, grief and despair – have been animated for the film and weave together its individual stories.
There is Witold Ashurak, an activist whose friends send photographs to prison so he can hold on to the world beyond its walls. An anonymous young man describes remaining in Belarus despite constant surveillance and the threat of arrest because he wants to be there for his daughter. And Andrei Astapovich, former criminal investigator who fled through Russia to Poland, now gathers evidence against the regime he once served.
Elisabeth Lehmann, Commissioning Editor, DW Documentaries: “The situation in Belarus has all but disappeared from the news. Yet the regime is cracking down ever more harshly on any form of criticism, with international organizations reporting more than 65,000 politically motivated arrests since 2020. That makes work like that of Andrei Kutsila and his team all the more important. ‘Letters From the Silenced Country’ offers a powerful portrayal of just how precarious the situation in Belarus remains.”
Nadja Scholz, Managing Director Programming, DW: “Documentaries like ‘Letters From the Silenced Country’ ask a great deal of their audiences. But these are precisely the stories that need to be told and heard. Its premiere in Venice, at one of the world’s most prestigious film festivals, gives this important film the attention it deserves – and sends a signal that those affected have not been forgotten.”
“Letters From the Silenced Country” was produced by Mirosław Dembiński (DocEdu Foundation, Poland), Giedrė Žickytė (MOONMAKERS, Lithuania), and Gregor Streiber and Friedemann Hottenbacher (inselfilm produktion, Germany).
The documentary will be available on DW channels in spring 2027.
