“Donbas,” a documentary by Ukrainian director Serhiy Loznytsya, has been awarded best director at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival on May 18.
The film, which narrates Russia’s war on Ukraine, competed with almost 20 other movies shown at Un Certain Regard, the festival’s second most important contest. The jury chaired by Spanish-American actor Benicio del Toro awarded Loznytsya’s film as the section’s best director’s work, as Ukrainian producer Dennis Ivanov wrote on his Facebook page on May 18.
The “Donbas” movie was presented in Cannes on May 9 for its world premiere.
According to a review by the Buro 24/7 media outlet, the film tells a story that unfolds in the early days of Russia’s subversive invasion of Eastern Ukraine, “seized by insane people with automatic rifles and populated by those who are depressed and deceived.”
As the war intensifies, the story’s main characters are “compelled to adapt to life in a region where government institutions, as well as family and professional ties, are breaking up, and where things stop being called by their proper names,” according to the authors.
“Donbas” was filmed in the city of Kryvyi Rih by a multinational team originally from Ukraine, Germany, The Nederlands, France, and Romania. In Ukraine, it will hit screens later this year.
According to Ukrainian deputy prime minister Pavlo Rozenko, the movie’s production was supported by grants from the state budget.
Producer Dennis Ivanov also said that during his award speech, Serhiy Loznytsya noted: “In the last several days, while talking to journalists and film-makers, I realized how little they know about a war that’s going on in the very heart of Europe.”
Also, Loznytsya voiced his support for Oleh Sentsov, a Ukrainian director and activist sentenced to 20 years in prison by the Russian occupational authorities in Crimea on charges of terrorism in 2015. Despite numerous appeals, including by the Hollywood actor Johnny Depp, Russia refuses to free Sentsov or extradite him to Ukraine.
“No matter how hard the cruel and despotic regimes try to persecute us, to make us shut up and obey their rules, the art of film remains free,” Loznytsya said.
“Directors continue to break established canons and go beyond limits in search of knowledge and truth.”
