WORDS OF WAR FEATURES A MURDERED JOURNALIST
At the end of Words of War, photographs appear on the screen identifying some of at least 1,500 journalists who have been murdered since the year 2000, often in headlines, others quietly. The film, directed by James Strong, focuses on one of those, investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya (played by Maxine Peake).
The film begins in 2004 with Anna being transferred from a government hospital to a facility that will provide safer care and then switches to 1999, five years earlier, when she is assigned by Dmitri Muratov (Ciarán Hinds), chief editor of Novaya Gazeta, to cover the Second Chechen War. During her first visit to Chechnya, she observes Chechens walking in a line out of their home town. Seeking an explanation, she interviews some to discover that Russian forces have sought to bomb their residences, a clear case of a war crime. She then publishes articles critical of the war at a time when Russia still had some press freedom, as Vladimir Putin was not yet in firm control. (Mikhail Gorbachëv, former head of the Soviet Union, financed the publication with his Nobel Peace Prize funds.) In 2001, she modestly receives an award for human rights journalism.
On October 23, 2002, several armed Islamic Chechens take over the Dubrovka Theater in Moscow, holding 912 members of the audience hostage in a demand to end the war, cease all military operations, and withdraw all Russian troops from Chechnya. On October 25, Anna goes to the theater to mitigate the situation. But rather than allowing Anna to continue negotiations with the attackers, Russian security services release sleeping gas into the building early on October 26. With most of the attackers and audience dazed by the chemical, the theater is stormed, killing all 40 hostage takers. Not mentioned is the fact that 132 Russian hostages died, largely due to the gas.
In 2004, another Islamic hostage situation arises in North Ossetia, a province north of Georgia. Anna boards a plane to investigate, but soon collapses after drinking from a cup of tea supplied by a stewardess, and she is taken to a hospital, the one from which she is rescued by Muratov, who arranges her transfer out of the government hospital after learning that hospital personnel claim that she is not listed as a patient, a clue that the government intended to make her disappear.
But she is still operating as a journalist for the next two years until the day when an unidentified man assassinates her on October 7, 2006, in the elevator of her apartment building in Moscow.
Interactions with fellow journalists and members of her family provide a picture of her bravery and commitment to justice and truth, even martyrdom.
Words of War has been nominated by the Political Film Society as best film exposé and best film on human rights of 2025. MH