The Forum Groningen will screen the fiction film from award-winning Ukrainian filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa on Sunday, March 6. Donbass, a potent dramatized report from the theatre of war, was presented at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival in the Certain Regard section, for which it won the Best Director Award. The title is the name of the area we are all hearing about these days when the war between Ukraine and Russia is making the news.
The director chose to tell the conflict between the Putin regime and the Kyiv government, which turns out to have been a prelude to Russia’s invasion of the entire country, through the lens of black humor: the film depicts the daily tensions between supporters of the Russia-backed Donetsk People’s Republic and Ukrainian nationalists.
Donbass, co-produced by Ukraine, Germany, France, the Netherlands and Romania, is Loznitsa’s fourth feature. All of his previous films, My Joy, In a Fog and A Gentle Creature, screened in the official selection at Cannes.
The Forum Groningen will donate all proceeds to the Giro 999 account operated by refugee charity Stichting Vluchteling.
