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Ukrainian Short Film Competition 2023
Metro-tram
Director: Kateryna Yahodka
Country: Ukraine
The main character of the story is the son of the good old subway and fast tram. This premature child lives in the city of Kryvyi Rih.
One Aloe, One Ficus, One Avocado and Six Dracaenas
Director: Marta Smerechynska
Country: Ukraine
There is a washing machine wrapped in tape, meters-long indoor plants and their roots, and children's drawings among hundreds of boxes on which the addresses of Ukrainian cities are written. This place resembles a warehouse of lost things. The silence is broken by a woman's voice, that of the owner of one of these boxes. She is bidding farewell to her home in Kyiv, speaking of the belongings she left behind. Each item has a story, a memory that is being left behind. Through her words, the home seems to come alive, each item imbued with a sense of warmth and familiarity. People begin to appear in the so-called warehouse, taking their pieces of home in the form of parcels. They sift through the boxes, searching for their treasured possessions. Some are filled with joy, others with sadness. Meanwhile, a woman's voice questions: “Does the loss of belongings matter?”
Humans and subhumans
Director: Oleksandr Stoianov
Country: Ukraine
A legal drama about human rights violations in Soviet Ukraine and modern Russia based on archival chronicles. Heimrad Backer, in some of his projects, used the text of nazi propaganda in such a way that it became self-evident, commenting on itself. For the same purpose, I use excerpts from a soviet newspaper. I title parts of the film scenes to emphasize the absurdity, theatricality, and cruelty of the trial as well as the propaganda chronicle.
Waking Up in Silence
Director: Mila Zhluktenko, Daniel Asadi Faezi
Country: Ukraine
A former Wehrmacht barracks now serves as a refugee camp for people from Ukraine. Waking up in silence accompanies the children on their journey, where their own history intertwines with that of the barracks. A moment between past and future, war and silence, departure and arrival, which paints a portrait of Germany’s past and present through the eyes of its young protagonists.
Are you here
Director: Zlata Veresniak
Country: Ukraine
Oryna, an 18-year-old Ukrainian girl, fled her homeland during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, while all her family, including her 7-year-old sister Ksiusha, decided to remain there. The film observes the daily remote communication between Oryna and her younger sister and reveals their close bonds of sisterhood, which remain strong despite their separation, the constant presence of the war, and the natural process of growing apart.
Chornobyl 22
Director: Oleksiy Radynski
Country: Ukraine
An anonymous informant of the Ukrainian Armed Forces secretly films the movements of Russian troops in the occupied Chornobyl Exclusion Zone. Workers at the Chornobyl NPP share their experiences of living at the Russian-occupied nuclear power plant. Catastrophic scenarios from the past and present are intertwined in this macabre episode of the Russian invasion. The film was created as part of the project The Reckoning: Ukraine Testifies, which documents and investigates Russian war crimes in Ukraine.
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