Mstislav Chernov received the US Directors Guild Award for the film "20 Days in Mariupol". Chernov was awarded for "outstanding directorial achievements in documentary cinema".
This is stated on the DGA Awards website.
Along with Mstislav Chernov, directors Christopher Sharp and Moses Bwayo with the film "Bobby Wine: The Peopleʼs President", Madeleine Gavin with the film "Beyond Utopia", Davis Guggenheim with the film "Unchangeable: The Story of Michael J. Fox" and D. Smith with the film "City of Kokomo".
In his speech after the award, Chernov mentioned Russiaʼs daily attacks on Ukraine and, in particular, the shelling of his native city of Kharkiv.
"Seven people were killed, including three children. So itʼs a sad day. I am fully aware of the power of cinema as I stand here looking at you. Because when these children, these people are trying to escape from the shelling in shelters to cope with the fear, they watch movies. Cinema helps all of us cope with this sometimes unbearable world, an unjust world, and gives us hope to stop all the bad things and move towards a better future," said Chernov.
The US Directors Guild Award is one of the profile film awards that determines the potential leaders of the famous film award "Oscar". The film "20 days in Mariupol" was also nominated for an Oscar as the best documentary film.
About the film "20 days in Mariupol"
"20 Days in Mariupol" tells the story of the first weeks of fighting in Mariupol during the full-scale Russian invasion.
Director and photographer Mstislav Chernov, photographer Yevhen Maloletka and producer and journalist Vasylisa Stepanenko worked on the film. They became the last journalists to cover the beginning of Russiaʼs destruction of Mariupol — for which all three received the Pulitzer Prize.