Mr Nobody and the Russian army. Behind the Oscar‑winning documentary, Mediazona found the real soldiers, killed in action and still alive

The first soldier killed who is mentioned in “Mr Nobody Against Putin,” set in the Urals, namely the town of Karabash, Chelyabinsk region, is Maxim Kozlov. He was 22 years old and was mobilised in late September 2022. By early November, he had been killed near Svatove in the Luhansk region, where mobilised troops were sent to repel a Ukrainian counter-offensive.

The “Our Magnitogorsk” VK group quoted the soldier’s sister, Ekaterina: “There was no training; they sent him straight to the reconnaissance unit. The last time we spoke was on October 27; he called and said they were sending him to Svatove to assist the first company. And after that, there was no contact.”

Then Pavel Talankin, extracurricular activities curator at the Karabash School No 1, talks about the funeral of his childhood friend Artyom. During the farewell ceremony, he turned off the video, leaving only the audio: off-camera, he says that filming soldiers’ funerals is dangerous.

There may have been other reasons for doing so: an unknown voice mentions the death of Artyom Volkov. He never existed. But Artyom Glukhov, a native of Karabash, was killed near Bakhmut on April 30, 2023. He was 32 years old; he had enlisted as a volunteer in the Wagner PMC with the call sign “Duvda” and dog tag B-2354.

The third soldier killed, who is mentioned only in passing in the film, is an employee of the Interior Ministry who works with minors and the “boyfriend of Christina,” one of the heroines. The 30-year-old’s name was Vladimir Nikiforov. Like Maxim Kozlov, he was drafted and died in November 2023. The place of death listed on the death certificate is Donetsk, but this may not be accurate: the clerk who processed the documents may simply not have bothered to verify it.

Another person who died in the war and features in the film is the older brother of Masha, one of the students at School No 1. His name was Konstantin Mazurin, 30 years old, mobilised. We do not know the place of his death. His obituary does not even mention that he died in the war.

Several other military personnel are mentioned in the film. Right at the beginning, a teacher talks about the “feats” of Hero of Russia Colonel Alexei Berngard. He serves in the 810th Marine Brigade. This unit suffered heavy losses during the war, but Berngard himself is still alive.

One of the “lessons in courage” at the school is led by three mercenaries from the Wagner PMC. Mediazona was able to identify only one of them: 38-year-old Ildar Talipov, who was born in Yakutia but lives in Chelyabinsk. According to our data, he is also alive.

As of today, there are 35 people with connection to Karabash in our named list of KIA Russian soldiers. For the whole Chelyabinsk region, the number is 6,240.