Cannes: Ukrainian film shows trauma of war

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Maksim Nakonechnyi's “Butterfly Vision” is screened at the Cannes Film Festival. He tells of a Ukrainian soldier who is raped during the war. DW spoke to the Ukrainian filmmaker.

Rita Burkovska stars in “Butterfly Vision”

When a Ukrainian soldier returns home after two months in enemy captivity, she has no idea that she is pregnant. The father is the jailer who raped her while she was a prisoner of war. That's what the feature film “Butterfly Vision” is about, which premieres at the Cannes Film Festival in the side program “Un Certain Regard” (English: “A Special View”). DW met with the director ahead of the film's premiere on May 25 Maksym Nakonechnyi spoken. 

Deutsche Welle: Mr. Nakonechnyi, how did “Butterfly Vision” come about?

Maksim Nakonechnyi: Since the invasion of Crimea in 2014, when the Russian war against Ukraine started, my fellow filmmakers and I have wanted to do something. We made many films about the situation. Many of my friends had to do military service, including many women. And then I heard their stories, their experiences.

As I sat editing my documentary film “Invisible Battalion”, which tells the story of women, veterans and female soldiers, I heard certain statements and Scenes over and over again. I was deeply impressed by your perspective.

Although Butterfly Vision is a feature film, it was inspired by true stories. How much did the real cases and stories you heard influence the film?

There was this one sentence from a female soldier about her imprisonment that went through and through to me. The soldier said that being captured was the worst thing for her. She didn't want the Russians to know that she was a woman. She even had a deal with her fellow combatants that if she was in danger of being taken prisoner by the Russians, they would kill her.

Watch the video 03:09

Ukraine War: Rape as a weapon of war

< p>Based on this statement, I began to research: first with my co-author, then together with the leading actress. We spoke to different participants in war crimes: eyewitnesses, victims – we collected their stories. And we not only gathered the facts, but also looked at how they dealt with the experience after surviving the events. All of that went into the film, for example in acting or working with the camera. 

The film was filmed in Donbass. How difficult, how dangerous was it to work there?

During the research, we visited our soldiers at the front to familiarize ourselves with the environment and the details on site. We had to take certain security measures for our own protection. 

The shooting locations were not on the actual front, but the scene about the prisoner exchange was filmed in Donbass. We chose the location in 2020, the shooting took place at the beginning of 2021. The Russians were just increasing their contingents on our borders.

We were preparing to arrive on location when the local authorities contacted us and told us it was too dangerous to film there. We would have to shoot a little further from the border. 

That was one of the dangers: there was a chance that the Russians would invade our location.

Now that your film appears, this has an even greater meaning. Meanwhile, Russia has invaded Ukraine.

Well, before the really big invasion started, when our war was still called a “frozen conflict”, both internationally and in Ukraine itself, there was already a rift, also in Ukraine.

That was it a difficult situation for the soldiers and the people who had experienced the horrors of war and returned to peaceful civilian life. It was difficult because their experiences were met with a certain indifference by those who hadn't.

Now that it affects every Ukrainian citizen, every Ukrainian family and household, it has become clear that you cannot really understand something until you experience it yourself. But you can at least be aware of it – and that is the key to living together as a society. 

Unfortunately, this realization was not so present before the invasion. That was also one of the reasons why we wanted to make the film.

The makers of “Butterfly Vision” have announced that they will demonstrate against the war on the red carpet in Cannes for the premiere on May 25, 2022

There is a lot of talk about Ukrainian films and stories in Cannes. What do you hope people will take away from this?  

First of all, the presence of Ukrainian artists at such a big and well-known festival is a contribution to our struggle for survival, because our cultural identity is under attack. Therefore, every success of Ukrainian culture, every place where it is loud, visible and noticed, contributing to its survival, keeping it alive and allowing it to thrive. 

That's something I hope an international audience takes with them after watching my film: people know that we are here, not just where the war is taking place. It goes much further, it affects all areas of life.

But I would also be happy if the film inspires thoughts about the future, because it tells a story about survival. A story about the will to survive, about the will to keep fighting. And I hope that he will contribute to our survival, that we keep fighting as Ukrainian society, and also all other progressive democratic societies worldwide.

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    Solidarity with Ukraine

    The film festival in Cannes is also showing solidarity in view of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine. The festival management excluded official Russian representatives and Russian filmmakers. Only director Kirill Serebrennikov, who lives in Germany, was admitted to the competition.

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    Russian film entry: “Tchaikovsky's Wife”

    Serebrennikov's film “Tchaikovsky's Wife” (“Tchaikovsky's Wife”) was admitted to the competition on the grounds that no Russian funding was provided are, the director was under house arrest in Russia and has lived in exile in Germany since his release. The film is about the famous composer Tchaikovsky, who marries a young woman to hide his homosexuality.

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    Sergei Loznitsa: director from Ukraine< /h2>

    Sergei Loznitsa (pictured) is probably the most renowned filmmaker in Ukraine. His film The Natural History of Destruction is screened out of competition at Cannes. A young colleague of his is also represented: In “Butterfly Vision”  Maksim Nakonechnyi tells a surrealistic story of a fighter, the pilot Lilja. Meanwhile, Nakonechnyj is at the front.

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    War in Film

    Director Mathieu Vadepied's film “Father & Soldier” focuses on a historic war: a Senegalese father enlists in the army in 1917 after his 17-year-old son is conscripted to serve in France in World War I to fight. The role of the father is taken on by the French film star Omar Sy, known worldwide for the Netflix series “Lupin”.

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    Rock 'n' roll legend returns

    Australian director Baz Luhrmann, known for box office hits like 'Moulin Rouge' and 'William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet', shot a biopic about Elvis Presley. The rock'n'roll legend is played by US actor Austin Butler, the film is out of competition.

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    Jury President Vincent Lindon

    After US director Spike Lee chaired the jury last year, this year the honor goes to a Frenchman: actor Vincent Lindon. Last year he played the male lead in 'Titane,' which won the Palme d'Or. Lindon himself won Best Actor at the 2015 Film Festival for his role in The Value of Man.

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    Humorous opening film

    This year's festival will open with the zombie comedy “Coupez!” (“Cut!”) by French director Michel Hazanavicius. This film is also out of competition. The director also involved his family in the film: In addition to Lyes Salem (left), Raika Hazanavicius (middle) and Simone Hazanavicius (right) can also be seen in this excerpt.

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    Familiar Faces

    The directors competing for the Palme d'Or in Cannes are well known: Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda (pictured) previously won a Palme d'Or in 2018 for his film Shoplifters. His South Korean colleague Park Chan-wook, as well as US legend David Cronenberg and Swedish director Ruben Östlund are also taking part in the competition.

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    A shameful few women

    21 films were admitted to the main competition, only four of which were made by women. Bruni Tedeschi (pictured) applies with her film “Forever Young”, Léonor Serraille presents a migration story between the Ivory Coast and Paris with “Mother and Son” and Claire Denis tells in “Stars at Noon” by a couple in Nicaragua.

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    “Showing Up”

    The American director Kelly Reichardt is the fourth in the league of female directors in the competition: her comedy “Showing Up” (in German about “Aufkreuzen”, “Kommen”, “Da sein”) is about a sculptor who, in addition to an exhibition opening also has to master all the other madness of life. Michelle Williams (pictured) stars.

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    A slightly different Empress Elisabeth

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    No Germans in the competition, but…

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    Author: Julia Hitz, Christine Lehnen


Before the war, Ukrainian stories outside the country were perhaps perceived as being strongly influenced by Russian stories are influenced. Do you think the way Ukraine is seen has changed now? 

Ukrainian stories and perspectives may have run the risk of being sidelined. Tiredness could have set in; for people abroad there was a feeling that the war that started in 2014 was somehow over. So they wondered why Ukrainian filmmakers wanted to keep telling stories about the war. Now it's quite obvious why.

And of course there was this misconception, the misperception of Ukraine as part of a larger “post-Soviet imperial culture”, if you want to call it that. That was of course the result of propaganda.

Now we hope that there will be a rethink and that it can no longer be reversed. We hope that we will now be perceived as authentic actors and participants in a global cultural process, that our identity will be recognized in all its aspects – cultural, political, social, existential, metaphysical – and that this post-colonial identity will be recognized as a separate, sovereign identity, with all the consequences.

Scott Roxborough conducted the interview.

Translation into German: Christine Lehnen