Well I’ve seen plenty of fly on the wall documentaries over the years, but rarely one that’s so fly in the ointment. The ointment in question being Vladimir Putin’s overt manipulation of school children in Russia to make sure the pupils and their teachers all dance to the tune of his “special military operation” in Ukraine. Pavel “Pasha” Talankin is a teacher in a town hitherto known as the most toxic place on the globe - Karabash. Famed for it’s copper industry, this place pollutes like nowhere else, but Pasha has an affinity for his hometown. He was born here, went to school here and now lives with his mum whilst also acting as the school’s videographer. He’s an unassuming fellow, but when he is asked to film more and more propaganda and sees the extent to which the government are pulling the strings, he begins to consider how he can rebel. By his own admission, he isn’t a brave man - nor are any in his town of 10,000 - but he is determined to try to use his skills to best advantage. That means filming. Ostensibly recording the flag waving jingoism and the scripted school poetry competitions, he also films other things including a history teacher extolling the virtues of some of Stalin’s less savoury companions. He flies the flag of democracy and soon spots a police car parked outside their block of flats. With the newly beefed up crime of treason the stuff of Peter the Great, it is only a matter of time before his dissenting spirit is apprehended. Maybe it’s time to get out of Dodge - for “Dodge” is certainly what it has become. More generally, this does quite effortlessly illustrate the power of a propagandist media when it comes to convincing and rabble-rousing. There’s even a song on television about “our nuclear weapons ready to be fired” just to galvanise a population that is being sold on this being a mission from God to free their brothers in arms from the degenerate neo-Nazis across the border(s). You don’t have to know much about this conflict, you just have to watch this man provide the odd piece-to-camera then show us some video evidence that horrifies. The indoctrination and weaponisation of children seems to be an increasingly popular policy for governments and religions alike these days, but rarely have we seen it presented in such a blatantly intimidatory fashion. Of course, he isn’t a “Mr. Nobody”, he’s probably more of a “Mr. Everybody” but what are the chances the Kremlin will pay a blind bit of notice to his recordings? Lies, lies, and more lies - the spirit of Dr. Goebbels lives on, but not in Kyiv.