Screened Jews of the Russian World : Race, Fate, and History in Putin's Heroic War Films

ABSTRACT: The paper analyzes how Jewish representations in Russian government-supported war films from 2010 to 2018 have been engaged in the assertion of Vladimir Putin's foreign and domestic political agenda. The paper argues that the re-emerged heroic war genre—the principal Russian ideological medium—has employed Jewish representations and Jewish historical narratives in order to instrumentalize and re-interpret them for the benefit of the new Russian imperialist ideology and Vladimir Putin's current political agenda. Using such films as The Match (Malyukov, 2012), Battle for Sevastopol (Mokritsky, 2015), Sobibor (Khabensky, 2018), and others as illustrations, the paper infers that contemporary film representations of Jewish identities are inspired by the Soviet models adjusted to transmit the idea of Russian state messianism. The paper explores how Jewishness , represented primarily on a racial account, is culturally downplayed compared to some privileged Russianness , until it comes to the recognition of the allegedly universal values of the latter and the readiness to share its historical destiny.