Rashid Nugmanov | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1954-03-19)March 19, 1954 (age 71) |
| Other names | Rachid Nougmanov |
| Occupation(s) | Film director,political activist |
| Years active | 1987–2010 |
Rashid Nugmanov (also writtenRachid Nougmanov;Russian:Рашид Мусаевич Нугманов; born March 19, 1954, inAlma-Ata,Kazakhstan) is aKazakhfilm director,dissident,political activist[1] and founder of theKazakh New Wave cinema movement.[2]
Rashid Nugmanov was born into aMuslimKazakh family on March 19, 1954. After graduating in 1977 from the Architectural Institute inAlma-Ata, Nugmanov enrolled at the prestigiousMoscow State Film Institute (VGIK), the world's first institute ofcinematography in 1984.[3] His directorial debut,The Needle, premiered in September 1988 at the "Golden Duke" Festival in Odesa, where it won the Un Certain Regard prize. Starring popular Soviet rock musicianViktor Tsoi, it was one of the first films to break thetaboo against talking aboutdrug addiction in theSoviet Union.[4] The film was released in theUSSR in February 1989 with 1,000 prints in circulation and became abox office hit viewed by over 30 million cinemagoers.[1] The film was also a critical success, winning First Prize at theNuremberg Film Festival and initiating the "Kazakh New Wave". He declared, in 1990, the motto of the New Wave of Kazakh cinema: "We demand no unified philosophy nor uniform artistic views on art. We are unified, instead, in our freedom and love of art".[5] Nugmanov served as President of the Union of Kazakh Filmmakers from 1989 until 1992, when he wrote, directed and producedThe Wild East, apost-apocalypticpunksamuraiOstern which attracted international acclaim atfilm festivals inVenice,Los Angeles, andTokyo, and was awarded the Prix Special du Jury inValenciennes, France. The film marked the end of both the Kazakh New Wave and Nugmanov's active directorial career,[6] although he continued to write screenplays throughout the 1990s.
Nugmanov moved toParis, France, in 1993 and currently serves as the General Director of the International Freedom Network, aLondon-basedthink tank created to fosterdemocracy in theformer Soviet Union.[7] A harsh critic of the political regime ofNursultan Nazarbaev, which he has decried as amafia,[8] Nugmanov has been responsible for theinternational relations of dissident organisations including the Forum for Democratic Forces of Kazakhstan and Central Asia, Republican People's Party of Kazakhstan,Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan, andFor a Just Kazakhstan.
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