May 27 (Bloomberg) -- Filmmaker Andrey Nekrasov made a powerful and incendiary intervention on behalf of his late friend Alexander Litvinenko in Cannes when his documentary ``Rebellion: The Litvinenko Case'' screened yesterday as a late ``official selection'' at the 60th Film Festival.

``Rebellion...'' makes no pretence to impartiality. It presents extended interviews with Litvinenko, his widow Marina, murdered journalist Anna Politkovskaya and others as evidence of what it alleges is the Russian government's responsibility for acts the authorities have attributed to terrorists. For Litvinenko and for Nekrasov the buck goes all the way to the Kremlin.

Litvinenko's principal thesis, carried forward here by Nekrasov, was that Russia's Federal Security Bureau, the FSB, is simply the KGB in a new guise, and that the alleged involvement of FSB elements in financial scandals and political murder, including those of Litvinenko and Politkovskaya, indicates a deeper level of corruption in Russian's elite than most people are aware of people. The ideology may have changed, but the power elite remains the same.

Litvinenko, in the film, is emphatic in his assertion that Russian military and intelligence agents were responsible for the bomb that destroyed a Moscow apartment block in 1999. That the blame was subsequently laid at the door of Chechen separatists, goes the argument, is simply a way of inciting Russian nationalism to deflect attention away from the poison closer to home.

Politkovskaya

In another sequence, a group of former intelligence officers claim have been briefed to carry out politically motivated assassinations. Referring to one assignment, one of their number says: ``I was to catch him because he had sued the director of the FSB.''

Politkovskaya tells of her excitement about breaking a news story that a ``terrorist'' who had been involved in the Russian theater hostage taking in October 2002 was now employed by the government of President Vladimir Putin. Expecting a flurry of queries and phone calls, she is surprised by the lack of reaction to her expose. Nekrasov goes out onto the streets of St. Petersburg to try and buy a copy of her paper, Novya Gazeta. He can't find a single outlet that stocks it.

The film has attracted interest in part as it was only announced May 23 that it would be screening at Cannes at all. That was one day after British prosecutors indicated that they would formally charge Andrei Lugovoi, a former Russian intelligence office, with Litvinenko's murder and seek his immediate extradition to face trial in the U.K.

Lugovoi

Lugovoi has repeatedly said he is innocent.

Nekrasov told The Hollywood Reporter and Reuters that there was no connection between the two announcements, despite their proximity.

Lugovoi is among those interviewed by Nekrasov. In the film, he also denies involvement in Litvinenko's death.

``Rebellion...'' is never less than compelling and Litvinenko makes an impressive witness. The film is also strong on providing a potted background history of Soviet and Russian political oppression.

However it's right to remain at least a little cautious. The two men became friends over the period that Litvinenko lived in the U.K. and Nekrasov was clearly deeply upset by his death. And while much of the interview footage with Litvinenko is new, the arguments he makes have, for the large part, been heard before.

Religious Conversion

More time spent on Litvinenko's conversion to Islam from Christianity would also have been helpful. Did he become a mystical Sufi? Or a fundamentalist Wahabi? His father cries when asked about his conversion, showing the camera two Russian Orthodox icons he had brought to his dying son's bedside.

Reservations notwithstanding (and such is the labyrinthine nature of all secret intelligence agencies that we may never have all the facts), Litvinenko's murder was bizarre and cruel and ``Rebellion...'' demands answers to some very uncomfortable questions. For now, the Russian establishment is staying tight- lipped.

``I beg you, if anything happens to me, show this tape to the whole world,'' Litvinenko told Nekrasov before he died.

Russian Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov's comment May 23 that the dispute between Russia and the U.K. is ``no problem'' is about to be put to further test.

http://www.festival-cannes.fr

(Iain Millar is a critic for Bloomberg News. The opinions expressed are his own.)

To contact the writer of this review: Iain Millar, in Cannes, at id.millar@virgin.net.

Last Updated: May 27, 2007 13:02 EDT