Miss GULAG USA / 2007 / 65’ / Video, HDV
Director: Maria Yatskova
Production and Sales: Neihausen-Yatskova & Vodar Films, Irina Vodar, +1 646 220-5982 This e-mail address is being protected from spambots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , Raphaela Neihausen, +1 917 804-1375 This e-mail address is being protected from spambots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , This e-mail address is being protected from spambots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , www.missgulag.com

Behind the beauty pageant staged by female inmates of a Siberian prison camp emerges a complex narrative of the lives of the first generation of women who came of age in the Post-Soviet Russia. Miss GULAG chronicles the lives of three women: Yulia, Tatiana, and Natasha. Despite the everyday adversity in prison, they manage to uphold their humanity and humor through the comforts of music, love, and outrageous fashion. These women live a harsh life under the constant surveillance of UF-91/9, but once released, they find no relief.

Maria Yatskova was born in Moscow, Russia, in 1976 and immigrated to the United States with her mother and grandmother five years later. She studied journalism in France and Belgium and graduated with a B.A. in Film Studies from the New School for Social Research in New York. Currently, Maria is in Baku, Azerbaijan, at work on a film about Mstislav Rostropovich.