MELBOURNE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
A scene from the film.
DONBASS
121 minutes
Forum, August 10, 1.30pm
Hoyts Melbourne Central, August 17, 6.45pm
You won’t always grasp exactly what outrage is being committed in this film or who is doing it – not unless you have a good working knowledge of Ukrainian provincial flags, military uniforms and factional acronyms. But there is no mistaking director Sergei Loznitsa’s anger at what is happening in his adopted country.
Donbass is on the eastern border of Ukraine, currently part of Novorussia. In a series of 13 linked episodes, Loznitsa runs the grim gamut of a village tank invasion, venal bureaucrats, checkpoints, war profiteers and, most bizarrely, the creation of “fake news” for the television bulletins that go out every night, almost as if life were going on normally.
The film is set in Donbass in Ukraine.
Except that it isn’t, of course: the old and poor have resorted to living in a maze of underground bunkers, while above ground a man accused by the placard around his neck of being part of an “extermination squad” is tied to a lamp-post to be insulted and finally beaten to death by passers-by.
Loznitsa imbues much of this with a savage humour that is occasionally stretched too thin. There are certainly no good guys, which complicates the confusion over who’s who in this bloody carnival.
What it does have is a dazzling, furious energy, both in its postcard narratives and its eye-popping visual style.
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