Donbass

This film was sponsored and financed by various organizations in the Ukraine and European countries, so one expects (and gets) a generally uncomplimentary picture of the people of the breakaway Donbass region of Ukraine. However, the picture is not one-sided; for instance, we are shown people living in crowded, unsanitary cellars to escape the constant, unpredictable Ukrainian shelling of Donbass cities and towns, with no military objectives and plenty of civilian casualties.

The question is: what is real and what is staged or reenacted? Some sequences (such as the wedding) may have been shot from reality, perhaps with some rehearsal, but others are clearly staged, such as that where a prisoner Ukrainian soldier is abused and insulted by a crowd. The framing of the shots is careful and deliberate, and the prisoner, as many other characters in the movie is played by a professional actor. Finally, one episode is clearly trying to depict the banditry and brutality of the Donbass militia, so one could hardly expect the militants to appear voluntarily in front of the camera in an unfavorable light.

Perhaps the key to the film is given by Ukrainian director Sergey Loztnitsa in the first episode, where a crew of actors is seen staging and playing a bombing incident for the camera (the same crew is attacked in the end but we are never sure if the violence is real or staged). Perhaps Loznitsa is trying to warn the viewer to take the proceedings with a grain of salt. The Donbass is referred to in the movie as "separatist" and as an "occupied territory" of the Ukraine. The first is correct but the second arguable: no occupiers are in sight. All in all an incomplete but fascinating view of the Donbass and its people in the period preceding the present war, although watchers should exercise their critical sense.