We're talking fur hats, leather jackets and chain smoking as we move over the border and into the country nobody knows (or even recognises): Transnistria. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Transnistria has been a detached republic in the midst of Moldova with its own passport, an elected president and legal system. The state is just not recognised by anyone but themselves. Critics of the country and its system describe life in the republic as but a dog's life, but national pride is great and the president himself believes his country to be a paradise on earth. Its political system is described in the film as 'modified democracy', as democratic processes such as freedom of expression and freedom of assembly are under state control. And as a spectator of the show that the country is, democracy also comes across as highly 'modified' for sure. Synchronous military parades and a president with a lifetime job, whose bizarre election videos are transmitted on TV around the clock, are definitely not standard operating procedure in a well-functioning democracy. Lukas Kokes & Klara Tasovska's 'Fortress' raises the iron curtain and gives us an incredible insight into a country we did not even know we should know about. Sharp and darkly funny, but with the brutal political oppression lurking just beneath the surface. (The screening on November 7 is followed by an afterparty arranged in collaboration with Magasinet Udvikling.)

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