Top News

Russian filmmaker Pasha Talankin lost his Oscar statuette after JFK Airport security barred him from carrying it onboard, forcing him to check it as cargo. Upon arrival in Frankfurt via Lufthansa, the award went missing. The airline has launched a search, while Talankin, already in exile, faces an unexpected loss.

Los Angeles: Russian filmmaker Pasha Talankin, the co-director of Academy Award-winning documentary "Mr. Nobody Against Putin", has lost his Oscar statuette after security officials at New York airport refused to let him board a flight with it.

Talankin, who was also the protagonist of "Mr. Nobody Against Putin", which won the Best Feature Documentary at this year's Academy Awards, said at a security checkpoint at JFK Airport on Wednesday, an official stopped him from carrying on board the statuette, which weighs approximately 3.8 kg.

He added that he had flown more than a dozen times with the Oscar since winning it in March without any incident.

"It's completely baffling how they consider an Oscar a weapon... (I) flew with it in the cabin, and there never was any kind of problem," Talankin told the outlet from Frankfurt, Germany, where he arrived Thursday morning on a Lufthansa flight.