Review of Ukrainian movie Militantropos
At the Cannes Film Festival, in the prestigious parallel section « Two -week directors », they showed a full -length Ukrainian documentary about the Militantropos War. This is the first part of the « days I would like to forget » that has been in development for several years. A new movie movie Tabor Chooses a bold and global angle – a common topic is the study of changes in human behavior in war.
Film Criticine UP. Sonya All -loving Culture looked at the team at a closed show in Kiev and tells about the results of this, without exaggeration, titanic cooperation Alina Gorlova, Elizabeth Smith and Semyon brain.
It will not be a lot of surprise that a new Ukrainian documentary, which was noticed by a large movie festival in Cannes, was again created in the aesthetics of observing documentary.
After the experience of Olga Zhurba, Catherine Gornostay, Yuri Rechinsky – and these are just some of the names – it is clear that the removed static camera, which explores the war from the observer’s position, is the unbridled resource, which our directors continue to master professionally.
Talking to a common cinema, they build a panoramic portrait of a certain social phenomenon caused by war: evacuation, schools, normalization, nature – these niches are inexhaustible, as well as grief, which is felt behind the scenes.
These films also have a powerful effect in festival movement – they promote military documentary, first of all emphasizing artistic qualities.
The tape promises « to investigate the human state in the conditions of broken reality of the Russian invasion of Ukraine »
Photos provided by the movie command
It is known that the festivals are tired of war. It should not be expected that platforms such as Cannes, Berlin or Venice, in the third – fourth year would be made by the film exclusively through the political agenda. On the contrary, Ukrainian directors create a creative art cinema about cruel reality, realizing that the slogan about « dissemination of war and war crimes ” Not enough.
The international audience should also be able to speak about artistic language.
The movie « Militantropos » eloquently complements this paradigm, distinguishing its very ambitious and abstract theme. According to the synopsis, the tape promises « To investigate the human state in the conditions of broken reality of the Russian invasion of Ukraine « .
In an attempt to cover such globality, a team of three professionals was formed: Alina Gorlova, Semyon Mozgovy and Elizabeth Smith. Although their careers differ from each other, they, like the other directors mentioned, combine that their documentary experience was formed in military conditions. For many of them, the war was the starting point in the direction.
Directors who previously shot chamber films on specific topics in « Militantropos » are united around the topic of abstract. Their achievements are a two -hour excursion into the transformation of a Ukrainian person in a full -scale war.
This history compars the development of militarism in Ukraine with archaic rural life. Of course, urban realities in the tape are also present. But it is the rural storyline that looks most convincing and carries a deep philosophical load.
Alina Gorlova, Elizabeth Smith and Semen Mozgovy worked on the film.
Photos provided by the movie command
Actually, the very name of the film, premeditatedly made up of two archaic words, echoes something eternal and ancient: « Antropos » – a man, « Milit » is a warrior.
If Antropos, according to the documented image of traditional Ukrainian houses and their summer civilian inhabitants, is something very indigenous and even soothing sometimes, Milit violates into this life.
The picture begins with the exposition of the first days of the invasion and stops at the training of territorial defense – the human being clumsily takes in the hands of weapons. It does not take a lot of timing of the movie as the camera will move to zero. Sometimes it stands just behind missile installations or finds its place in the trench.
And the next frame – the camera watches the inhabitants of the frontline zones, which are forced to continue to plow the land, bypassing the fragments of rockets. It is for this comparison of two binarys that every element of movie examination of the movie is aimed at, seeking to be angry at a certain point.
The tape is a two -hour excursion into the transformation of the Ukrainian person in a full -scale war.
Photos provided by the movie command
The strongest and most productive contact between the directors can be observed in their high assembly skills. To remember at least Alina Gorlova’s film, which she installed, « This rain will never end » – one example of poetic installation in the history of Ukrainian cinema.
Of the more than three hundred shooting days that were lying on the table, they were able to find a common mounting language for the extraordinary metaphors.
Sometimes the material and its location in the tape work perfectly. What is worth the scene, shot somewhere in the Ukrainian south. A couple of workers on the watermelon field watches the sunset, and under their feet lies a broken bright red juicy watermelon. After heavy scenes of fighting and military hospital, this seemingly innocent watermelon acquires the worst associations.
Although such a related collaboration undoubtedly adds to the film features in the production and variety of thoughts, it creates the opposite effect – complete synergy in the film does not occur.
« Militantropos » lacks a clear focus in their statements. And although the tape carefully fills it with philosophy and explanatory intertes, pluralism of thoughts and an array of material presses its weight.
However, it is this effect of incomplete synchronicity that gives the film random interpretation. Looking « Militantropos », one of the most famous philosophical ideas is mentioned that humanity has comprehended since the doctory – from Heraclitus to Susan Sontag. And if the war is more natural, more inherent in man than peace? However, if so, why can’t they be synthesized as a whole?
