ZHIZN VECHNAYA

To begin with: statements by young teens about whether they want eternal life. Reality doesn't look like that: there have been battles in Donetsk up to the present day (2017) and they will soon also be conscripted for military service. Which side they will fight on remains vague. They live in the so-called Donezkaya Narodnaya Respublika (DNR), but "Ukraine" still has to appear on international envelopes. Until then, they are mainly one thing: polite, interested young citizens and passionate gamers. While what they experience on the screen – a video game, for example, in which the airport has to be conquered – is not only mixed in Alexey Telnov's documentary film with reports on the hostilities by TV and radio, but also with the everyday observations that Gleb makes as a private mail distributor travelling across the destroyed city. Whether the opera house or tram depot, playground or an apartment building in ruins: the war in "Novorossiya" seems particularly pointless for those who are clinging on to their homeland. BW