Alec Baldwin’s Western Rust had its world premiere Wednesday at a film festival in Poland, three years after the shooting death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set.
The premiere was dedicated to Hutchins at the International Film Festival of the Art of Cinematography Camerimage.
Organizers held a minute of silence before the screening to a full house.
Hutchins’ mother, Olga Solovey, refused to attend and said she viewed the premiere as an attempt by Baldwin to “unjustly profit” from her daughter’s death.
Baldwin, the lead actor and co-producer, was pointing a gun at Hutchins during a rehearsal outside Santa Fe in October 2021 when the revolver went off, killing Hutchins and wounding director Joel Souza.
Baldwin has said he pulled back the hammer — but not the trigger — and the revolver fired.
Souza introduced the film at the festival, a popular industry event dedicated to cinematography.
He told the audience that initially after the accident he couldn't have imagined continuing with the production, or even working on a movie set or writing again.
But Hutchins' husband, Matthew, wanted the film to be finished, and came on as an executive producer.
Filmmaker Rachel Mason is a friend of Hutchins who was tapped by Matthew Hutchins to make a documentary about his late wife.
Mason told the audience that Hutchins mother told her that she wanted the film to be completed because of how important the project was to her daughter.
Hutchins was a 42-year old Ukraine-born cinematographer on the rise and a mother of a young son when she was killed.
She grew up on a remote Soviet military base and worked on documentary films in Eastern Europe before studying film in Los Angeles and embarking on a movie-making career in the U.S.
In July of this year, a judge dismissed an involuntary manslaughter charge against Baldwin in the fatal shooting.
He still faces civil lawsuits, including one by Solovey. The film armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, received the maximum sentence of 18 months in jail for involuntary manslaughter.
Adapted from Associated Press articles by Vanessa Gera.
