Dreams About Putin

What is repressed and unspoken returns as dreams and nightmares in this cinematic essay about the shaping of the unconscious in times of war.

Following the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, many people started to dream about the Russian president Vladimir Putin. People have recorded and shared over 1000 of these dreams on social media, creating a surreal archive of the troubled collective unconscious in times of war. In Dreams of Putin, these visions are brought to life using a combination of found footage and scenes created in Unreal Engine, a 3D graphics programme for designing computer games. Fascinating in both its experimental form and themes, this is a film that is destined to remain in the subconscious of all who see it.

This film will screen as part of the programme Shorts: Sculpted Lands.