“Everything Will Not Be Fine” is a documentary so well-crafted that it serves more than just a cinematic purpose – it’s a hopeful and therapeutic film about the lives damaged, but not broken, by the Chornobyl nuclear disaster.
It was recognized as the best picture in the Ukrainian program at this year’s Odesa International Film Festival.
But one can’t help but think of what this film could have been if it didn’t go through the industry pipeline with its many workshops and consultations. Most importantly, “Everything…” could have been a lot worse if its Romanian filmmaker and protagonist Adrian Pirvu was not joined by Ukrainian Helena Maksyom in making and living through the film.
And though a critic should analyze a film for what it is, looking at “Everything Will Not Be Fine” in terms of what it could have been can help best reveal some of its strengths and weaknesses.
The actual story starts when Pirvu’s mother traveled to Ukraine while pregnant – just when a nuclear reactor exploded at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant in 1986. Pirvu was born blind three months later in Romania, but the doctors managed to restore his left eye’s sight. Still, he struggles with glaucoma and blames the catastrophe for his misfortunes.
The film starts in earnest when Pirvu decides to travel to Ukraine. Feeling adrift after a break-up at almost 30, he wants to find others like himself affected by Chornobyl. And since he had finished a film school in Bucharest, why not make a documentary out of that?
That was the first possibility where things could have gone wrong. In a Q&A session at the Odesa festival, Pirvu said he first thought about making a fact-based documentary about Chornobyl or people affected by it. It’s a good thing he changed his mind.
A beginning filmmaker would not contribute much to the wealth of knowledge from dozens of documentaries on history’s worst nuclear disaster. Some of the best are Soviet Ukraine’s “Chornobyl – Chronicles of Difficult Weeks” (1986) that provides the first record, Discovery channel’s “The Battle of Chornobyl” (2006) and “Chornobyl Heart” (2003) short about the children born after the disaster.
The theme has even been explored, quite factually, in HBO’s award-winning feature TV series “Chornobyl” (2019).
“If someone believes Chornobyl is bad, they don’t need another film to tell them Chornobyl is bad. And if someone believes that everything is fine now and it has passed – a new film about it won’t convince them,” Pirvu rightly said during the Q&A.
The trailer for “Everything Will Not Be Fine” documentary (Deckert Distribution).
So instead, Pirvu starts to work on a personal documentary about himself on his travels, a choice just as problematic as a fact-based documentary.
“A cinema of me” is a popular method in modern documentaries, which requires a filmmaker (the subject) to be their own protagonist (the object). But such a film can be quite frankly boring, unless the filmmaker is a fascinating individual, or unless they can ascend beyond their ego to make a film about collective experience, “a cinema of we.”
Pirvu can’t pull that off, at least by himself. That’s why the first minutes of “Everything Will Not Be Fine” seem rather bland and unpromising. Pirvu focuses on his handicap, and one expects that he will whine and complain about his life for the rest of the film.
That is until in Kyiv he meets Maksyom, who becomes the co-director and co-narrator of the film. The Ukrainian also seems to be affected by Chornobyl – she has a backbone ailment that causes her chronic pain. But she doesn’t let it define her and steers the film in a more uplifting direction.
As Pirvu and Maksyom become intimate with each other, “Everything Will Not Be Fine” becomes a love story. It’s a road movie too. The protagonists travel together for the next four years: to see the exclusion zone, to meet other so-called “children of Chornobyl” in Belarus, and to get surgeries in Germany and Lithuania.
The story becomes truly collaborative, like a dialogue that carries the individuality of both directors. In the streets, on trains, or in bed, Pirvu and Maksyom film each other while talking about their feelings and traumas. These talks are bold and sincere, perhaps because of the hours spent together with a camera turned on.
But there are also times when they contemplate quietly. In Belarus, they meet Anton and Katya, who lead a loving life together, and watch them dance despite severe physical disabilities. The couple introduces the protagonists to Dima, Valya and Zina, who went completely blind because of glaucoma, but live their lives with a sense of joy and wonder.
The people they meet were supposed to be the original protagonists of the documentary. But Pirvu and Maksyom use them to advance their own storylines, showing how these lessons can benefit the viewer too.
“For most of my life, I was angry for being half-blind because of Chornobyl,” Pirvu says in the voice-over. “Dima and his friends did not dwell on the connection … and did not waste time being angry.”
In the most heartbreaking scene, we meet Milana, a six-year-old with severe body deformity who is about to go to school. The strong-willed girl says she wants to be a spy and ask the scientists to create a machine that will turn her into “an ordinary woman.”
Maksyom, who identifies herself with a “Fucking Special” tattoo on her back, asks her: “Maybe you’re just a special girl?” But Milana replies forcefully: “Please don’t call me that! I’m simply Milana.”
Adrian Pirvu (L) and Helena Maksyom, directors and protagonists of Everything Will Not Be Fine” documentary, share a moment while speaking at a Q&A session of the Odesa International Film Festival on Sept. 29, 2020 in Odesa, Ukraine. (Volodymyr Shuvayev / Odesa International Film Festival)
The film’s outstanding achievement is in weaving an engaging personal story about trauma, love and hope from footage spanning countries and years. Pirvu and Maksyom masterfully combine their intimate home-video with powerful scenes about other people affected by Chornobyl. Unexpectedly for many, they also received the best director prizes at the Odesa festival.
But although the film seems completely natural and sincere, let’s not forget that it’s a product of the industry, of several producers and editors who helped polish it. Pirvu and Maksyom cut several stories about people they filmed for years – a bedridden girl on life support, for example.
“The film could have gone in a more pessimistic or darker direction,” Pirvu said in the Q&A. “But we can’t show this … suffering and crying just to make people cry. We wanted to be balanced.”
The film industry also infiltrates Pirvu’s and Maksyom’s moments together in the film. About midway through, another cinematographer starts to film their intimate talks. A question arises then: do they start acting differently when another person films them, an agent from outside?
But generally, it seems that Pirvu and Maksyom are honest and sincere both as protagonists and filmmakers. One proof is that they didn’t try to twist the plot into something that would look good on screen. Unlike a perfect love-story narrative, their love doesn’t last. They went where it led them and learned to let it go.
Everything will not be fine, after all. But that’s okay if you learn how to live with it.
This story was produced within the Intensive Course for Film Critics organized by the Contemporary Ukrainian Cinema NGO. The content is independent of the organizers.
