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\n Oscar-winning director Woody Allen has defended his appearance at a Moscow film festival following strong criticism from the Ukrainian government.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cWhen it comes to the conflict in Ukraine, I believe strongly that Vladimir Putin is totally in the wrong. The war he has caused is appalling,\u201d said Allen in a statement sent to CNN by his assistant on Monday.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cBut, whatever politicians have done, I don\u2019t feel cutting off artistic conversations is ever a good way to help.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n Allen\u2019s statement came after the Ukrainian government slammed his decision to appear as a headline guest at the event at the weekend.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cWoody Allen\u2019s participation in the Moscow International Film Week is a disgrace and an insult to the sacrifice of Ukrainian actors and filmmakers who have been killed or injured by Russian war criminals in their ongoing war against Ukraine,\u201d said Ukraine\u2019s Ministry of Foreign Affairs in a statement earlier Monday.\n <\/p>\n
\n The Moscow International Film Week is sponsored by Russian state media, state-owned companies and the Moscow City Government.\n <\/p>\n
\n A photo shared on the festival\u2019s official telegram channel shows the 89-year-old movie maker taking part in a session via video link, in conversation with Russian director Fyodor Bondarchuk, who is a Putin ally and has publicly supported Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine.\n <\/p>\n
\n According to the festival\u2019s press service, Allen said he liked Russian cinema, mentioning the Soviet version of \u201cWar and Peace\u201d that was directed by Sergei Bondarchuk, Fyodor Bondarchuk\u2019s father.\n <\/p>\n
\n Russian state media reported that during the session Allen said that, while he has no plans to make a movie in Russia, he has \u201conly good feelings for Moscow and St Petersburg.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n And Russian envoy Kirill Dmitriev claimed that Allen\u2019s appearance at the festival proved \u201cRussia isn\u2019t isolated.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cTrying to cancel Woody Allen over a video call at the Moscow International Film Festival misses the point: Russia isn\u2019t isolated \u2013 and art should build bridges, not burn them,\u201d Dmitriev wrote in a post on X.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Facebook Tweet Email Link Oscar-winning director Woody Allen has defended his appearance at a Moscow film festival following…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":111624,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[236,88],"class_list":["post-111623","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111623","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111623\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}