Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has effectively knocked out the country’s film industry, resulting in a starkly diminished presence at the Cannes Film Festival this year – though the war is still very much part of the Cannes conversation. Maciek Hamela’s documentary “In the Rearview”, about the evacuation of Ukrainian refugees, has ensured that Ukraine's plight is represented on the big screen too. FRANCE 24 spoke to the Polish director about filming in a warzone and giving a voice to those displaced by war.

The war still raging in eastern Europe made a stark reappearance at the world’s premier film festival late on Sunday, when a woman dressed in the blue and yellow colours of the Ukraine flag covered herself in fake blood on the red carpet ahead of a gala premiere, before being spirited away. The protest echoed a red-carpet incident last year that saw an activist strip off her clothes to reveal the words “Stop raping us” written across her torso, next to a flag of Ukraine.

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