On February 24, 2022, Yevhen, together with his friends, volunteered to join the first aid squad on the front line. They provided life-saving support and evacuation of the wounded. This film reveals the experiences of these young men for six months full of drama, despair, fear, hatred, bitterness, love, and, most importantly, faith in victory.
The enigma of the personality cult is revealed in the grand spectacle of Stalin’s funeral. The film is based on unique archive footage, shot in the USSR on March 5 - 9, 1953, when the country mourned and buried Joseph Stalin.
An immersion into the intimacy of Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the USSR. The architect of perestroika and glasnost, who was praised in the West but reviled in his own country, still combative despite his advanced age, loneliness and illness, offers his personal and political testament.
For five teenagers living in the conflict-ridden Donbas region of Ukraine, a Himalayan expedition provides a brief escape from reality. A portrait of a generation that, in spite of everything, is able to recognise and celebrate the fragile beauty of life.
The Zharkov family-father, mother and two young sons-belong to the Dolgan community, one of the last indigenous peoples pursuing their traditional nomadic life in the extreme north of Siberia. The children used to be sent to boarding school, where they became estranged from their family and culture, but nowadays they can get homeschooling from teachers assigned to them by the Russian authorities. Seven-year-old Zakhar and his older brother Prokopy are the protagonists in this calm, observational film. Zakhar's first year of schooling is with Nelly, a young but serious teacher. She tells him about President Putin and the importance of mathematics, and he learns classical poems by heart.
A girl from St. Petersburg walks around protest-ridden Moscow, talking to riot police and believing that sooner or later they will go over to the side of the demonstrators. An 18-year-old student of a St. Petersburg college introduces herself as Alice and tells about herself that from the age of four she lived in an orphanage and in foster families. In Moscow, Alisa, for whom this is the first rally in her life, walks along the police cordons and looks under the OMON helmet. "Under the mask you can't see, are you even human?"
A comprehensive chronicle of the consequences of Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022. How citizens live in wartime, how violence and death condition daily life: from schools in bomb shelters to rehabilitation centers for the maimed; wounds and silences, gestures and words.
Oleg Kirillov - coach of the intuitive football team. It's hard to believe, but his wards are members of the national football team of the Republic of Belarus among the blind. Each of them appeared on the field for various reasons, but today they face a common task - to maintain their champion status in the national competition. Kirillov himself grew up in a disabled family and knows well how to communicate with his wards. He is not only a mentor, but also a friend of each of the athletes. An important element of the film is work with sound, it completely restored the sound environment that is natural for players, in which they focus on the noise made by the ball and the clear instructions of the coach.
The presidential campaign in Belarus in 2020 did not bode well for surprises. The permanent (since 1994) head of state Alexander Lukashenko went to his sixth term. During this time, an authoritarian political regime was established in the country. None of the real applicants were registered as presidential candidates: some were arrested, others left the country. As a result, the only competitor of the incumbent president was the housewife, the wife of one of the political prisoners, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya.
This film about the Baltic nation of Lithuania from 1989 to 1991, when it broke away from the Soviet Union. This period of peaceful protests involving lots of singing came to be known as the "singing revolution."
Anatoly Ganne is sixty two years old. For thirty three years he’d been in prison. During his life Ganne followed thieves' concepts: not to have any family and home - so that there was nothing to take away. Now he is settled in Moscow, got married and has a son. But Moscow authorities are trying to take away his house.
The Donetsk Airport, Ukraine. Rebuilt in 2012, but now a scene of utter devastation - shortly after Russian-backed separatists have taken it over. Weaving together the voices of fighters on both sides supported by battle video, we tell an unvarnished story of war through the eyes of those who were there. The desperate fight for an airport whose capture seems more symbolic than strategic, they also show how human nature can adapt - in sometimes disturbing ways - when one's life is on the line.
Documentary about the life of Sergei Parajanov, a prominent Soviet-era filmmaker who was active in Ukraine, Georgia and Armenia and was persecuted by the communist government for his views on the pretext of his homosexuality, which was a crime in the USSR. The centerpiece of this documentary is Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors, a 1965 movie directed by Parajanov, that awakened the Ukrainian national consciousness which had been suppressed by decades of Soviet rule.
The film Broken Ties, by independent Russian filmmaker Andrei Loshak, is an unflinching portrayal of families divided by war. It features seven different pairings, whose members speak periodically with Loshak, one-to-one, to explain their points of view. Their conversations extend over the war's first three months, during which time their opinions evidence no change. The film makes no attempt at dialogue -- on the contrary, it is a testimony to the absence of dialogue amidst an unfolding war, and an unsentimental diagnosis of the sickness of a society in which official propaganda proves stronger than even the most intimate family ties.
In the winter of 2021 rallies were held in Russia in support of Alexei Navalny. People protested against the arrest of the politician. The number of those detained at the rallies exceeded 17,000 people, many of whom received administrative punishment in the form of arrest. There were not enough places for detention in Moscow, and therefore the detainees were sent to the Center for the temporary detention of foreign citizens in Sakharovo near Moscow. As a result, an unusual group of people gathered in the special detention center - almost a thousand young men and women who were close in spirit. This film is their memories of their days behind bars.
The story of the two wrestler girls in and out of the ring. Mephisto, the champion of the NFR and the champion of India, is a the sales manager in everyday life, while Casey, or the Queen of the Scream, is a recent graduate of the University.
Underground Belarusian poets read their own verses inspired by the experience of living in 2020s Belarus. Sometimes poetic fiction and harsh reality collide in the picturesque backgrounds.
Minsk Komarovsky market is the main food market in Belarus. People call it “Komarovka”. It organically coexists people of all ages, backgrounds and characters. While for some the market has become a second home, others continue to dream of more.
"Mariupol. Reconstruction" is a film about a lost city. Director Svetlana Lischinskaya shares her memories and tells the story of her relationship with the city. She meets with refugees from Mariupol to remember with them what the city was like before it was destroyed by Russian troops
On the 11th of November 2018 the elections were held in the self-proclaimed Luhansk People's Republic. One of those who came to vote is a former locksmith Alexander Zaslavsky, a participant under the call sign "Old" in the battles in 2014 and 2015.
