“Cannes Devoted Iting Day, May 13, to Ukraine, Screening Three Documentaries, Outside Its Official Selection, Dedicated to the UKRAINIAN PEOPLE IN THEIROING. Those films look at a key figure in the conflite – Zelensky, WHICH TRESES THE LIFE OF UKRAINE’S WARTIME President Volodymyr Zelensky”, – WRITE: www.hollywoodReporter.com
MilitantroposWHICH HAS WORLD Premiere in the Directors’ Fortnight On May 21, Takes A Very Different Approach to Telling The Story of the Semingly UNDING WAR. Co-Directors Alina Gorlova (This Rain Will Never Stop), Yelizaveta Smith (School Number 3), and Simon Mozgovyi (The Winter Garden’s Tale) Began filming on the first day of the full-Scale Russian Invasion, Feb. 24, 2022.
They didn ‘set out to capture the map of the Battles LOST AND Won, But The Impact Years of Conflict have on everyday life. With Their Impressionist Feature Documentary, Told Without Voice Over or Explanate Dialogue, They Explore How Ending Conflict TransForms Ordinary, Pios, “MILITANTASFLE INTO” Soldier (“Milit” and the Greek Word for Human (“Antropos”) Meaning A Persona Adepted by Humans WHEN Entering A State of War.
The Directors of Militanantropos, Along with Producer Eugne Rachkovsky, Spoke to The Hollywood Reporter About Howing Through Three Years of War Has Transformed Their Personal Identities, How The Film Evolved Into A Collective Portrait of A Country At War, and Whather Art Cana. “Can We Change People’s Minds Through This Film? Is It Possible to Do that Through Art?”
Before We Start Talking About the Movie Itelf, I Want to Ask All of You – Referencing The Title of Your Film – What Has Living War For More Thran Years Meant to You Personally? What has it meant to become militantropos?
Simon Mozgovyi That’s whos we wanted to make this film. We noticed, Both in Ourselves and in Ukrainian Society, A transformation Taking Place. We Feel How The War Has Become Part of Us, and We’ve Somehow Become Part of the War. I Think It Gives Us The Opportunity to See The Importance of Human Existence Itself – The Importance of Life, and the Importance of Making Choices for Your Life.
Yelizaveta smit For me, from the beginning of the full-scale invasion, living in Wartime have meant constant Making choices, Constantly Questioning Yourself. Should You Stay, OR Should You Leave? I have a child, for example. Should i be doing something for the army? Everyone is Asking Themselves Tese Kinds of Questions. Honestly, I Feel Stressed All The Time. You Just Try to Stay and Resist, with All Your Strenguth. You Tell Yourself: “Just A Little Bit Longer.” But It’s Been “Just A Little Bit Longer” for Three Years Now. What Really Helps Are The People AROUND YOU-YYUR CLESE Ones, Your Co-Authors, Your Friends, Your Horizontal Connections. That’s what helps you have survive, Both Mentally and Physically.
Eugone Rachkovsky Part of Our Discussions AROUND THIS PROJECT CENTED ON OBSERVING HOW this transformation is hapning within US. You canrate it -you’re in the Middle of it. It Pushes You Town Inner Transformation, Town Activity. What Yelizaveta Said is true: The Form It Takes Differs from Person to Person, and You’re Constantly Questioning Your Choices. As Artists, We Feel Like We’re Doing Something Important in the Moment, But We Also Keep Repeating Ourselves. Now, After Three Years and Completing the Film, We Can Feel It More Clearly. That’s Also WHY MANY OF US VOLUNTEER – BECAUSE IS A WAY TO BE ACTIVE, TO BE HELPFUL. Not Only to the Army, But To The People AROUND US. For me, it, been a very personal exploration of how war has become a part of of our lives – And how – Even if it ends, It will Never Fully Disappear. It Will Leave Traces for Generations.
Alina Gorlova YES, I AGREE About the traces. I was Thinking About this While the Other Were Speaking. IT’s Such A Diflicult and Complex Question. Personally, I Feel i’ve Changed Completely. There Were Many Doubts About Art As Well. IT WAS HARD NOT TO Feel Disillusioned – Seeing How Global Politics Works, How The Media Works, How Public Opinion Can Shift So Quickly. But I Still Belide in the Importance of What We’re Doing with This Film. I Want to Feel That It Has An Impact. Can We Change People’s Minds Through This Film? I It Possible to do that things?
Militantropos CourTesy of Directors’ Fortnight
WHAT WAS The Original Idea Begind the Documentary?
Yelizaveta smit WELL, OUR PRODUCTION Company have existed for 11 years, and Even before the Full-Scale Invasion, Each of Us Was Making Films About War. We All Dreamed Of Canging The Topic Someday. But WHEN the INVASION BEGAN, IT BECAME OBVIUS THAT WE HAD to KEEP DOING THIS -We’d been Exploring Itady from Already from Different Angles. That’s what the Film has such a collective spirit: It Brings Together All Our Perspectives on the Nature of War. This Project Triers to Explore The Core of It – Through the Transformation of Individuals, and As A Collective Portrait of People Who Have Become Part of the War, and in Turn, the War.
It Started with Exploration – Vascing Questions of OurSelves and Each Other. Not Necessarily Looking for Answers. WHEN EVERYTHING AROUND YOU IS DESTROYED, WHEN YOUR FUTURE IS UNCERTAIN, YOU HAVE TO FIND NEW MEANING IN ORDER TO SURVIVE AS A HUMAN BEING. This film is an attempt to do that.
Simon Mozgovyi YES, AND I’D ADD THAT WHEN The INVASION BEGAN, The FILM WAS OUR WAY OF RESPONDING TO WHAT WAS HAPPENING AROUND US – EM to US. IT WAS OUR WAY OF HOLDING ONTO OUR IDENTITIES, OF TRYING TO UNDRSTAND OURSELVES IN THE MIDST OF Trauma and Horror.
Alina Gorlova And the Approach We used in the Film Was Also About Transferring this Experience to the Viewer. That guidted How We Worked with The Footage, The Editing, The Sound, The Music – Averything Was Meant to Evoke A Certain Feeling. In Our Opinion, Cinema Can Give Viewers A CHANCE TO COLSER TO THESE EVENTS AND ACTUALLY FEEL THEM. A Theater Can Be A PLACE FOR A PROFOUND EMOCAL EXPERIENCE.
Was that some you chose not to use voiceover or a traditional narrative structure?
Alina Gorlova YES. We Were Very Much Following Our First-Hand Experiences. The structure of the Film Reflects This: We Start From A Distance, Then Gradual Closer and Closer to the People. AT FIRST, WE Show The Broader Scale of Things. But Over Time, Both As Viewers and As Directors, We Started to Notice Small, Emotion Moments in the Midst of Massive, Horrifying Events. That’s how the structure devloped.
Simon Mozgovyi OUR Filming Approach Evolved Over The Two and A Half Years We Worked on It. The Footage Was Collected Across That Entire Period, and We All ExperienCed Transformation Durying that Time – Both As Directors and As Cinematographers. In the first year, we have were simply reacting to evults from Our Own Starting Points. But Through Editing and Review the Footage, We Realized We Wanted to Get Closer. SO The FILM IS STRUCTUREED IN THREE PARTS: The INITIAL REASONSE TO THE INVASION, the Point Ware War Becomes Part of Every Life, and Finally, A Deeper, More intimate. Militantropos.
In terms of visual Language, Much of It Happy Instinctiely. We’ve Worked with Our DPS for Nearly a Decade, SO Our Visual Intuition Was Already Aligned. The Film’s Structure and Visual Style Emerged Very Naturally.
Yelizaveta smit To add briefly: we all agreed early on to use a static, an observational style of filming. We Wanted to CAPTURE REALITY WITHOUT IMPOSING TOO MUCH INTERPRETATION, SO NO MOVING CAMERA, NO DRAMATIZATION. That distance, Especially Early in the Film, Gave Us a Clear Method for Engaging with the World AROUND US. Later in Editing, We Began to Find Emocial and Symbolic Connections Between Scenes. By then, we have 70 terabytes of Footage, and we chose to focus very clarly on a collective portrait of transformation. That’s WHY The Film Gets Closer and Closer As It Progresses.
Militantropos CourTesy of Directors’ Fortnight
And your company have been makeing warfre-before the full-scale invasion?
Eugone Rachkovsky YES. Since 2014, We’ve Been Filming in Donbas and Eastern Ukraine. One of Our Documentaries, This Rain Will Never Stopwas also shot partly in kurdistan. SO We Were Already Working on the Topic of the Russian-Ukraine War. After the Full-Scale Invasion, Our Work Expanded Into this Larger Project.
Yelizaveta smit We ALSO MADE A FICTION FILM, Butterfly Visionabout the war. This Topic Has Been With Us for Many Years – We Simpladn Cultn’t Look Away.
Alina Gorlova I COUNTED – WE’VE MADE FIVE FEATURE FILMS ON TOPIC. Right Before The Full-Scale Invason, We Had Just Finished Butterfly Visionand we Told Ourselves, “We Don’T Have Any More War Films in Development.” We Really Thought That Was It. That was a real conversation we had.
Of all the experiences you have while Making the Film, the People You Met, the PLACES YOU VISITED, WHAT MOMENTS LEFT The MOST LASTING IMPRESSION ON YOU?
Alina Gorlova There’s An Older Woman About 15 or 20 Minutes Into The Film. She’s Gardering in a Completely Destroyed Village and Cooking Soup Outside. Her House Had An Amazing View – It Was Big and Beautify – But It Was Destroyed by the Russians. She was living in the basement. She Had Other Housing Options, But Chose to Come Back. She Kept Gardering and Cooking for Us, and She Kept Saying, “We Need Victory. We Need Victory.” That Really Stayed With Me. We Helped Her – We Brough in Volunteers and Built a Shelter Next to Her Basement, and Bough Suppplies to Make Her Life More Comfortable.
Simon Mozgovyi For ME, Two Scenes in a Forest We Called “Silver Forest” Were Unforgettable. IT’s on the administrative border Between Luhansk and Donetsk. I WANTED TO CAPTURE OF THE FEELING OF FEAR -ing Being Close to The Enemy Without Seeing Them. IT WAS A VERY RISKY SHOTOOT, BASICALLY AT THE FRONT LINE. Later, We Went to A Nearby Town, Lyman, and Found a Woman to Host US. She didn’t ask for money -sha just asked for a Russian cake. That small gesture was so touching. I Brough Her Three Cakes. We Were Late, and Because of the Curfew, She Couldn’t Open the Door. It Felt Like Something Out of A Dark Fairy Tale – A Hherere Opening A Door at Night Might Lead to Danger. It Really Stayed With Me.
Yelizaveta smit There’s a scene in the first part of the Film, in Chernihiv, A City Heavily Bombed Near the Russian Border. We Arrived Three Days After The Occupation Ended. No Electricity, No Food, No Water. We wren’t prepared. In a nearby Village Called Yahidne, We Met A School Guard Who’s Showed Us The Basement Where Villagers Were Held by Russia – Lined Up on Chairs for 30 Days. Many, Especially Men, Were Kild. While We Were Filming, I SAW The GUARD SITING IN HIS OLD SPOT, IN THE SAME POSE, Reliving His Trauma. It Hit ME DEEPLY – I KNEW IT Wuld Stay with Him Forever. And Probably with me, too.
Eug Ene rachkovsky Every Scene Left A Mark. One Especialy Intense Experience Was in Kherson, After The Russians Blew Up A Dam and Flooded Parts of the City. Volunteers from Across The Country Came to Rescue People and Animals, While Russian Forces Were Still Shelling Them. IT WAS TERRIFYING, BUT ALSO POWERFUL – SO MUCH HUMAN Energy and Unity. Another Bright Moment: Yelizaveta and Our DP Went to Southern Villages and Met Amazing People. That Evolved Into a volunteer Initiative to Rebuild Destroyed Homes. IT Became A Separeate Project, Now Run by Filmmakers, Production Designers, and Costume Designers, Who’ve Turned Into Volunteers. It Started with Our Search for Locations and Turned Into Real Rebuilding.
Simon Mozgovyi YES, AND I’D JUST ADD THAT WHAT STAYS WITH YOU ISN’T JUST The HORROR – IT’S THIS MIX OF EMOTIES. The Strenguth, The Love, The Care People Show -Foror Each Other, for Animals, for Housses, for Plants. It’s not about good or bad – is about that Powerful Human Respense in the Midst of It All.