Alexey Feodosievich Wangenheim, a famous meteorologist, professor at the Moscow State University, the founder and first head of the USSR hydrometeorological centre, was arrested on January 8th, 1934 and sentenced to ten years in the Gulag prison-camps on a standard charge of “espionage” and “wrecking”. He was sent to the Solovki Special Purpose Camp (known as SLON). October 9th, 1937 A.F. Wangenheim was sentenced to death. The sentence was executed less than a month later on the mainland, in the tract of Sandarmokh. He was buried together with 1,100 prisoners in a communal grave. His wife and daughter did not know anything about his fate until his exoneration in 1956.

The letters of Alexey from the Solovki prison-camp to his wife, Varvara, and daughter Eleonora have been preserved. The letters addressed to his daughter, represent a kind of compiled textbook created by a caring father who was forcefully torn away from his family. He sends his daughter a herbarium of Solovki plants, draws birds and animals that live on the island, shows astronomical phenomena in the drawings: the northern lights, a solar eclipse, and composes riddles for his young daughter to solve.

A.F. Wangenheim wrote 168 letters, of which 141 letters reached their recipient.

Once in 2018, I visited an exhibition where the history of Russia’s most notorious and largest Gulag prison-camps was transmitted and analysed through the preserved herbariums and plants of different people who were detained there. Generally, they were just trivial artefacts. However, the story of Professor Alexey Wangenheim and his daughter was an exception. Their story transcended the Soviet period, it pertained to something larger, something that can be understood by anyone in this world – a relationship between a father and his child. Wangenheim’s story is driven by the desire to keep a fairy tale alive for his daughter, even in the most inhumane circumstances. The herbariums that he sent her were obtained with great difficulty in prison-camp conditions. Involuntarily parallels were drawn between the herbariums and the fragility of human life. It seemed that the whole meaning of Wangenheim’s existence was concentrated in these letters, as he tried to have a positive impact on his daughter’s life at all costs. Even at the cost of his own life.

Wangenheim’s story is one of tragedy, but also of resilience – the kind that allows sensitivity and love for the wonders and mysteries of nature to survive the most oppressive and cruel circumstances. He was executed, like most prisoners, and buried in a common grave. After discovering their story, I could not continue further through the exhibition and cried. Then I thought that if their story touched me so deeply, today in the 21st century, then it can surely touch another person. Political repression in the Soviet Union hasn’t been investigated enough in Russian cinema. We are taught to regard the obvious tragedy as an exceptional measure. However, this kind of violence continues to repeat itself to this day the world over. It is important to convey that we can always find strength in ourselves and remain human. This is why we had to make this film.

The herbariums that he sent to his daughter seem to be a powerful metaphor for Wangenheim's destiny. A fresh flower is picked, put between thick volumes of books, deprived of light, until all the moisture, the rest of its life force evaporates. Likewise, Wangenheim, at the dawn of his years, is taken North, to the Solovetsky islands. Like thousands of others, he withers and dries up like a flower. In parallel to the story, he tells his daughter about the dandelion flowering cycles, from birth to death. We created an animated world, rhyming the fragility of Wangenheim's fate with the fragility of the dandelion plant.

I am to this day in contact with the Russian International Foundation Memorial to which the letters and illustrations belong, the herbariums, all the existing archives. The person in charge of the archive, Irina Ostrovskaya, has expressed her full support for Father’s Letters. A development and production grant from the French CNC only facilitated our negotiations. Now the film is finished and was produced with the support of CICLIC and their animation residency, France 2, region Grand Est and Marie de Paris. My French co-producers, Igor Courtecuisse and Clémence Crépin Neel have also put us in contact with Olivier Rolin, who wrote The Meteorologist, a book published by Le Seuil, on the history of Wangenheim and who is enthusiastic about sharing his vision of the story. We fed the script with our access to these public archives and biographical novel.

My main goal is to try to make a difference for talented aspiring filmmakers in my country. Creating a convincing co-production case between Russia and France with Alexey Evstigneev’s next project was very important not only for me but also for the development of the Russian short film industry and our co-production possibilities as a whole. Analytical studies initiated by VOSTOK Russian short film agency show that Alexey’s 2020 short documentary film, The Golden Buttons, is among the three most successful Russian short films in recent history and the first Russian film to be nominated for the prestigious European Academy Award in at least the past 10 years.

I have the opportunity to make a difference for the new generations, opening opportunities and building bridges between Russia and the EU and ultimately with the world for aspiring Russian artists. I act by carrying out relevant Russian projects in order to improve Russia’s positive image, to create interest in Russian culture as a whole and to inspire Russian talents to be bold, courageous and strong in their work.

As long as I can, I will fight for Russian artists and their representation in the international film industry. With this project in particular, I would like to be able to create a successful co-production case, which will bring a promising young writer-director to do what is right at the beginning of his career and building it within an international industrial context, to accompany, guide and protect him, while trying to set an example of what true international collaboration means.

Alexey Evstigneev’s cinema is permeated by the generational question; whether it is that of a youth that has been recruited, taken away from itself (The Golden Buttons 2020), or of the legacy of the gulag and the camps (Father’s Letters 2022). In this animation project, Alexey also talks about transmission and resilience. Men who have endured from age to age the follies of their masters. Generation after generation, anger continues to unfold before a betrayed ideal.

Alexey’s and Yanna’s generation is actually ours. When we discovered The Golden Buttons at Visions du réel en 2020, we immediately wanted to meet Alexey Evstigneev. He put us in touch with Yanna Buryak, his Russian producer, whose work and determination we already admired at the Russian short film agency VOSTOK. It was with great pleasure that we decided to collaborate on Alexey’s new project, a co-production that made sense for all of us, but which was also rooted in an approach that we have cherished from the beginning: finding young talented writers and directors, and accompanying them from short to feature films.

By supporting Alexey Evstigneev France 2, CNC, CICLIC and our regional funds (Grand Est & Marie de Paris) defend more than ever a cinema that is being stifled and filmmakers that are fragile. Thanks to his work, however, he has been selected in prestigious laboratories, despite this difficult year, and in which he developed Father’s Letters, such as the “IDFA Talent Award”, the “Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival” and the “Fajr International Film Festival Talent Campus workshop”. Such a career path is unheard of for a Russian of his age, as attested by VOSTOK reports analyzing the participation of novice filmmakers in international laboratories.

Today, Alexey has already traveled an immense path, by himself. To officially recognize, by giving him a place in the international industry, the existence and the validity of this project is to recognize the existence of this Russian cinema separate from it autocratic government where the theme of the Gulag is censored.

As a French co-producer, our challenge was to then develop a relevant financing strategy. We put all the chances on our side to help this author to deliver this project in the best possible way. We very much hope that you will be sensitive to the strength of Father’s Letters.

FILMOGRAPHY (previous works)