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Eastern Front

Directed by Vitaly Mansky, Yevhen Titarenko

2023

Latvia

98 minutes

Unclassified 18+

Book Tickets

The brutal reality of the conflict in Ukraine is captured in Vitaly Mansky (Under the Sun, SFF 2016) and fellow Ukrainian director Yevhen Titarenko’s essential doc. Berlinale 2023.

Titarenko has been a member of the Hospitallers, a volunteer medical battalion, for nearly 10 years. Tasked with retrieving the injured from the frontlines, the poorly equipped medics scramble over trenches and ruins, frequently under shell fire. Using his body camera, camcorder and mobile phone, Titarenko captures one harrowing situation after another. Briefly on leave, the men and their families enjoy a rare respite from the carnage – a scene disturbing in its serenity. The co-directors aim in making this documentary was to alert the world to the reality of what’s happening in Ukraine; society should know the brutal truth.

I would not say we are happy to hear people’s shocked reaction to our film, but we say we are happy if it wakes them up to the fact that these are real people with their fears, their hopes, their dreams, fighting for their country, not cyborgs from Hollywood blockbusters.

Vitaly Mansky interview in The Guardian

Lviv-born Mansky… yet again dazzles with his clarity of expression, unparalleled feeling for dynamics and uncompromisingly humanistic viewpoint.

Vladan Petkovic, Cineuropa