November-2009 Event on Campus

The Ukrainian Film Club of Columbia University will screen and discuss the new feature narrative film “Birds of Paradise” 2008, by Roman Balayan. Born in Nagorny Karabakh and educated in Kyiv Balayan considers himself a student of legendary Serhiy Paradzhanov. However unlike his teacher, Balayan has avoided references to Ukraine in his films and used it at best as a geographical location rather than a cultural destination of his stories. His films represent an influential trend in the culture of a post-Soviet Ukraine deeply rooted in the imperial Russian mentality which denies Ukrainians a voice of their own. “Birds of Paradise” is about a Soviet writer in Kyiv in the early 1980s who challenges the regime in his quest for personal freedom. People can openly voice their thoughts only in private kitchens behind curtained windows. The KGB tap phones, survey the ‘unreliable’ and consistently destroy all forms of decent. The protagonists challenge the inhumane regime, risk their lives and prove that nobody can stop a person striving for freedom. Says Roman Balayan, “It is important for me to make a picture that confronts and pushes the viewer to face their own feelings and thoughts. It is important that even the most thick-skinned person feel what it means to have no freedom … so that the times when people could not speak the truth stay for ever in the past.” The film is one of the last roles played by celebrated Russian actor Oleg Yankovsky.

When: November 19, 2009, Thursday, 7:30 PM

Where: 703 Hamilton Hall, Columbia University Main Campus.

The film will be screened in its original Russian language version with English subtitles. Free and open to the public.

Yuri Illenko’s Prayer for Mazepa Returns

Yuri Illienko’s much criticized, maligned, and even ridiculed film Prayer for Hetman Mazepa (2002) is about to get a new lease on life. After seven years of oblivion the last film of the internationally recognized director has been re-edited, supplied with a new Surround 5.1 soundtrack  and in a matter of weeks will be all but ready for a theatrical release in HD Video format. The news was broken to the Ukrainian Film Club of Columbia University by Yuri Illienko himself.
Prayer was conceived as a Ukrainian answer to Braveheart by Mel Gibson and Polish blockbuster With Fire and Sword (1999) by Jerzy Hoffman. The project enjoyed a massive financial support of the then Ukraine’s prime minister Viktor Yushchenko and had the budget of $2.5 mln., the biggest for a film since independence. The historical drama, featuring some of the best actors Ukraine boasts, was widely expected to herald a much overdue revival of the Ukrainian national cinema. Instead Prayer proved a huge box-office failure and artistic disappointment.
David Stratton of the influential industry publication Variety described it as “a willfully chaotic picture … [whose] merits, such as they are, lie in its very craziness, certainly not in its utterly confusing way of telling a story…” One intriguing aspect of the picture seemed to be an anathema vocalized in person by the Russian minister of culture Mr. Shvydkoy which meant a de facto ban on its screening in the Russian Federation and made it into something of a forbidden fruit.
Yuri Illienko explained the poor reception of his film among critics and the viewers alike by the fact that it was never finished. After a short theatrical release and screenings at several film festivals including the Berlinale (outside the competition) the Prayer vanished from view for seven years and was nowhere to be seen or purchased, not even from all-having DVD pirates. It became something of a cinematographic enigma.
This year the copyright ownership for the Prayer was transferred from the original producer Yuri Didkovsky to the Illienko Films LLC created with the express goal to complete the making of this film and to bring it to Ukrainian and international viewer. According to Mr. Philip Illienko, Yuri Illienko’s son and a co-founder of the company, the new version of the Prayer  is “in fact a completed old film that up until now was not finished in what concerns its sound.” It is about fifteen minutes shorter. “The shortening of the film did not change its creative concept and artistic execution. In addition, the director’s background commentary was added with explanation of the historical context in which the events portrayed in the film unfold,  as well as the history of the making of the film. This addition of author’s voice outside the frame as a protagonist of the story is organically linked to the appearance in the frame of the director himself as well as with the sometimes subjective camera movements which all the time takes part in the construction of the mise en scène as a participant rather than a mere “reporter.” In the opinion the director this new addition will facilitate the viewers’ comprehension. The Illienko Films LLC is currently looking for partners and investors to effect the Prayer’s release in movie theaters and on DVD as well as its screening on television.
The Ukrainian Film Club of Columbia university is currently exploring the possibilities of screening the new version of Yuri Illienko’s  Prayer for Hetman Mazepa in New York City and other US venues.

“Fourth Wave” by Melnykova to Have Canadian Premiere

November 26-27, 2009. Toronto, Canada.

UFCCU will bring Victoria Melnykova’s new feature documentary The Fourth Wave, 2008 for its Canadian premiere organized by the Petro Jacyk Program for the study of Ukraine.

THE LIVING at Margaret Mead Film and Video Festival

November 12-15, 2009. New York, NY.

The Living, feature documentary by Serhiy Bukovsky made in 2008 to mark the 75th Anniversary of the genocidal Great Famine of 1932-1933 in Ukraine, a.k.a. the Holodomor, will be shown at the Margaret Mead Film and Video Festival held at the Museum of Natural History in New York City. The festival bills itself as “the longest-running, premiere showcase for international documentaries in the United States, encompassing a broad spectrum of work, from indigenous community media to experimental nonfiction. The Festival is distinguished by its outstanding selection of titles, which tackle diverse and challenging subjects, representing a range of issues and perspectives, and by the forums for discussion with filmmakers and speakers.”

The Ukrainian Film Club of Columbia University (UFCCU) is a forum of Ukrainian Cinema in New York City. It is a non-for-profit educational and cultural initiative within the expanding Ukrainian Studies Program at Columbia University. It was organized in October 2004. Its events are free and open to all. Its goal is to promote knowledge of Ukrainian cinema in the world. >>>

The UFCCU collection consists of the films donated by their directors to the Club or acquired through open commercial distribution. The films are made in Ukraine or in other countries on Ukrainian subject matter. Films are in DVD format with the exception of a few on VHS. Ukrainian-made films have English subtitles. As a matter of policy the Club neither loans nor duplicates the films in its collection, most of which are unique copies with English language subtitles. Instead we gladly accept invitations to screen films at various outside venues. >>>

Typically, a UFCCU event consists of a brief introduction by Yuri Shevchuk, the founding director of UFFCU and lecturer of the Ukrainian language and culture at Columbia; a screening; and a discussion with the audience participation. Events are organized thematically, around a chosen film either made in or related to Ukraine, or around an individual director or group of filmmakers. Ideally the Club would like to screen films with the participation of their directors. We have already hosted Taras Tomenko, Serhiy Bukovsky, and Taras Tkachenko of Kyiv, Ukraine, and Andrea Odezynska of New York, NY. >>>

Parallel to film presentations and lectures, the UFCCU runs various projects aimed at promoting the knowledge of Ukrainian cinema and Ukraine in the West. Among its on-going projects are:

• The International Translation Workshop

• Ukraine. A View from the West

• Ukrainian themes in Hollywood

• Ukrainian film in an International Perspective >>>

UFCCU exists thanks to the institutional support of the Ukrainian Studies Program, the Ukrainian Studies Fund, the Department of Slavic Languages, and the Harriman Institute of Columbia University. Financially it depends exclusively on generosity and support of individual and institutional donors. >>>

The Club's website Forum is provided for the audience of our many events and presentations to express their opinions and thus offer the filmmakers in Ukraine much-needed international feedback. The Club customarily notifies the directors whose films it will be screening next, and they often respond to audience comments expressed on the Forum. We actively encourage such participation in whatever language. We appreciate your comments both on films, film-related matters, and on our website and how it can be improved. When posting a comment on the Forum be sure to enter the password letters given above the "preview message" button into the blank space provided and then click on "post message". >>>