An Academy Award that went missing after being checked at an airport in New York has been located, according to Lufthansa.
Filmmaker Pavel Talankin said he was carrying the Oscar in his hand luggage while travelling from John F. Kennedy International Airport to Germany when security officers stopped him. Authorities reportedly insisted the statuette could pose a security risk and required it to be placed in checked baggage.
However, upon arrival in Germany, the award—won for the documentary Mr Nobody Against Putin—was missing.
Lufthansa later confirmed that the statuette had been found in Frankfurt and is now secure. The airline said it is working directly with Talankin to return the item as quickly as possible, while also launching an internal review into how the situation occurred. It added that it had apologised for the inconvenience.
The incident caused concern among the film’s team. Co-director David Borenstein described the situation as chaotic, saying staff hastily packed the award into a fragile box. Executive producer Robin Hessman also intervened by phone, questioning the decision and highlighting that Talankin had previously travelled multiple times with both his Oscar and a BAFTA award without issue.
Talankin, who often travels with the statuette for screenings and public events, had recently shown it to students during a university discussion in New York.
The Oscar itself stands about 34 cm tall and weighs nearly 4 kg, making it a distinctive and valuable item. The documentary it represents explores the spread of wartime propaganda in Russian schools following the invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Talankin is currently living in exile in Europe due to safety concerns, and the film has been banned in Russia for alleged extremism.
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Missing Oscar found after airport security incident
An Academy Award that went missing after being checked at an airport in New York has been located, according to Lufthansa. Filmmaker Pavel Talankin said he was carrying the Oscar in his hand luggage while travelling from John F. Kennedy International Airport to Germany when security officers stopped him. Authorities reportedly insisted the statuette could pose a security risk and required it to be placed in checked baggage. However, upon arrival in Germany, the award—won for the documentary Mr Nobody Against Putin—was missing. Lufthansa later confirmed that the statuette had been found in Frankfurt and is now secure. The airline said it is working directly with Talankin to return the item as quickly as possible, while also launching an internal review into how the situation occurred. It added that it had apologised for the inconvenience. The incident caused concern among […]
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