Films by Ganna Gryniva

Germany 2022, 66 min
by Mila Teshaieva, Marcus Lenz

By the time Russian army retreated from Bucha, Borodyanka, Irpin, houses were destroyed, civilians executed, and lives ruined. From the moment when they emerge from their shelters over the course of many weeks, the films follows various residents as they pick themselves up from the smoldering ruins. The dead are identified, debris is cleared, and prosecutors start talking about a war tribunal. But as the first blossoms of spring start appearing, these Ukrainians also reveal their resilience. Human spirit overcomes war and death.

Germany 2021, 29 min
by Pavel Mozhar

How do you go about crushing a protest? Handbook provides a comprehensive answer to this question. It includes almost everything, except no actual beatings take place in this instruction video.It’s August 2020. While in Minsk protests are mounting against Lukashenko’s re-election, Pavel Mozhar follows the developments in his homeland from his room in Berlin. Over these few days, around 7,000 protesters were arrested by the notorious OMON riot police.Mozhar studied hundreds of witness statements on the internet and discovered there was a systemic approach to the oppression. He transforms his room into a studio where he stages re-enactments of witness testimonies by a “police officer” wearing black clothes and a balaclava, and four “detainees” dressed identically in shirts and jeans. The result is distressingly instructive. [IDFA 2021]