Donbass

Opening night film with Sergei Loznitsa in person. Followed by reception.

Dir. Sergei Loznitsa. Germany/Ukraine/France/Netherlands/Romania. 2018, 110 mins. DCP. In Ukrainian and Russian with English subtitles. With Tamara Yatsenko, Liudmila Smorodina, Olesya Zhurakovskaya, Boris Kamorzin, Sergei Russkin, Petro Panchuk. In the Donbass region of Ukraine, a territory bordering Russia to the east, war has been festering and raging since 2014. Following the events of Euromaidan and the Ukrainian revolution, pro-Russian separatists have clashed with Ukrainian nationalists, which has involved a maelstrom of armed conflict, domestic terror, bureaucratic retribution, and propaganda. Based on actual events, and comprised of loosely connected vignettes, Donbass is a surrealistic journey into the dissolution of a society still staggering from a century of war, Soviet rule, and collapse. Along with the great cinematographer Oleg Mutu, world-renowned director Sergei Loznitsa (My Joy, Maidan) orchestrates an experience unlike any other, teasing absurdist humor alongside mortal horror, intertwining high style with journalistic attention to detail, and crafting a cinematic achievement for the ages that has the urgency of a news dispatch. Few works of scripted fiction have ever been this of-the-moment, and few films have ever been this singularly, extraordinarily, unshakable. New York premiere.

Tickets: $20 ($15 for members at the Standard through MoMI Kids Premium levels/free for members at the Silver Screen level and above). Order tickets online. (Members may contact [email protected] with questions regarding online reservations.)

Presented with support from the Harriman Institute and its Ukrainian Studies Program at Columbia University