At the XI St. Petersburg International United Cultures Forum, the panel discussion "Cinema as an Open Dialogue of Cultures: the CIS Today and Tomorrow" took place. The speakers discussed the importance of international festivals across the CIS and the significance of solidarity and joint promotion of cinema.
Participants in the discussion included Tolib Rahmatulloev, First Deputy Director of the state institution Tajikfilm; Mammetnazar Saparmyradov, Chairman of the Oguzhan Turkmenfilm Association; Taalaybek Kulmendeev, Chairman of the Union of Cinematographers of the Kyrgyz Republic; Dmitry Semenov, Director General of the National Film Studio Belarusfilm; Aidar Omarov, Acting President of the Shaken Aimanov Kazakhfilm studio; Furkat Usmanov, Director of the Center for the Development of National Cinematography of Uzbekistan; and Fedor Sosnov, Executive Director of the Cinema Fund, the Foundation for Social and Economic Support of Russian Cinematography.
Speaking about CIS countries entering the global film market, Tajikfilm representative Tolib Rahmatulloev noted the successful staging in 2023 of the first International Film Festival in the country's history in Dushanbe, which brought together around two hundred films from different countries. He also emphasized the importance of a memorandum of cooperation with VGIK, signed in January 2025. Thanks to this, an acting course for young talent has opened in Tajikistan, which Rahmatulloev called "an important step in training a new generation of film professionals."
"Our task is not only to preserve the national identity of cinema but also to shape a common cultural space together based on respect and trust," Rahmatulloev emphasized.
Furkat Usmanov, representing Uzbekistan, supported the idea of cooperation, noting that "the originality of national culture today is not a reason for isolation but a good opportunity for dialogue and mutual enrichment." The speaker mentioned the revival in 2021 of the Tashkent International Film Festival, which has become an important platform for interaction among CIS countries. In addition, Uzbekistan launched the large-scale project "Living History," which envisions creating 54 feature and documentary films by 2027, 18 of which are planned as international collaborations.
Fedor Sosnov, head of the Cinema Fund, shared information about positive trends in Russian cinema, noting increased audience interest in national films and their growing market share.
Since 2015, one and a half thousand cinemas have been built in the country. Our audience wants to watch our own films. The share of Russian national cinema over the last four years has grown from 27 percent to 80 percent. The market volume is larger than it was before Hollywood titles left, yet we are still constrained. We need to expand the film economy. The movies that we watch and create should become familiar to our viewers. This should stop being an exception or an achievement; it should become the norm," Sosnov stressed.
A further step to strengthen ties among CIS filmmakers could be the creation of a shared digital project. In particular, Furkat Usmanov proposed creating a science fiction saga similar to the series Black Mirror, with each episode dedicated to one of the Commonwealth countries. In addition, the speaker proposed the initiative of creating a unified digital environment for film distribution.
"In the recent past, we were one big family, and now we are united in a community. This is a good reason to implement a dialogue of cultures within the project and to develop it specifically in the digital space. We see how digital distribution is gaining tremendous momentum today, and it may be worth considering a single streaming platform for CIS countries. This is another path to expanding our market opportunities. The Commonwealth’s Asian region is not as saturated with domestic films as we would like. We have learned to make independent auteur cinema very well, but we should also develop commercial films,” said Furkat Usmanov, Director of the Center for the Development of National Cinematography of Uzbekistan.