Guerras Olvidadas: Chechenia

Russia decided to invade Chechnya at the end of 1991 and provoked an appalling situation in the Caucasian region. This article deals with the history of those two Russian invasions of Chechnya --from their origin until the current situation-- through the Russian film industry of this conflict. Moreover, this article focuses on different discourses of the film representation of the Chechen conflict. While ''Prisoner of the Mountains (1996)'', directed by Sergei Budrov, is a sensitive and respectful film in which there is a favourable discourse of defence of human rights, ''12 (2008)'', directed by Nikita Mikhalkov, presents a Russian nationalist discourse, whose influence on Russian society portrays the change of attitude towards the conflict and its justification. Hence both films are crucial in order to understand the elaborate discourses about present conflicts and prove the close link between politics and film representations.