'I feel sorry for you' It so happened that usually reviews describe not the artistic merits of the picture, but the subjective opinion of the viewer, his personal feelings. And in relation to this documentary, this thesis is more than fair. First of all, by virtue of genre and stylistics, this is, albeit selective, but still a chronicle of the events of two and even three years ago, all of us have long known thanks to the pervasive media. And therefore it would be very difficult to stand aside and not reflect the personal attitude to this film.
But the media in this case are not assistants, and very even opponents in trying to understand what actually happened. How is it that, in a remarkably short period of time, people from two neighboring countries suddenly hated each other passionately and vehemently without any adequate reason? And, of course, the main question is – how did everything that happened affect us today?
In my opinion, this documentary sheds some light on this situation. So, for the movie.
Structurally, it consists of two parts. But I will focus on the first part. It is built in a way that makes you a direct participant in events. And this one circumstance radically changes your view of the situation. Now it is possible to imagine such a scenario that it is YOU who are in Ukraine and fighting for independence, that YOU are rejoicing with the people in honor of the annexation of Crimea, that YOU are on the side of the ATO in the battle with the DPR and LPR, etc. There are no behind-the-scenes evaluative and propagandistic slogans and labels of the type ' Banderovtsy',' Crimean Nashevites' and other ugly breeds of hatred on the part of both countries. There are only people, their fates, and nothing more.
And most importantly, people here are DIFFERENT, neither good nor bad, but just suddenly involved in large and not always understandable processes, for which not all of them were ready. And it's a sad story, actually. But let's not get into the wilderness.
What I would like to point out here is how the film is built. The events here are arranged in chronological order, which makes it possible to trace this story, to identify any causal relationship. And that connection is very important. It says first of all that this is a tragedy, guilt and pain not of any one state, one way or another participating in this, I would say,' battle propaganda' This should make us think about how we have come to such an extent that we begin to believe in some artificially imposed picture of the world, in which we are necessarily the Absolute Good, and those ' Other' Absolute Evil. And if anything, it is not about Ukraine and all the ensuing.
I'd like to say one last thing. One of the strongest episodes of the film is associated with the colonel on the side of Berkut. He expressly orders his men to stop throwing grenades at protesters. The colonel, inflamed, rhetorically asks: “Do you see terrorists there?” To which one of the fighters visibly replies: "Yes." And the colonel, leaving, says: "I feel sorry for you."
And that's the point.