🎟️ Tickets! ☀️ Sundance 🌎 World Documentary 🇺🇦 Ukraine

If you've not been following recent news related to Ukraine or need a brush-up, there are two great documentaries for you to watch this year: 20 Days in Mariupol and Porcelain War. They are very different.

20 days in Mariupol contains some of the first images I remember coming out of Ukraine, including the footage of the hospital bombing that demonstrated Russia is targeting civilians. It's a hard watch. You'll live in that nightmare, where doctors tell reporters please film and show the world what is going on. You spend a lot of time watching medics weeping as they try to save patients' lives. It's a hard film.

If you are interested in a slightly more artistic approach, there's Porcelain War, a beautiful film that uses porcelain creatures to foreground the esprit de corps and creativity of Ukrainians facing circumstances that shouldn't exist.

If I wanted to be heartbroken and mad at Putin I'd watch 20 Days in Mariupol. If I wanted to feel proud of Ukrainians, I would watch this. Both films are something to be proud of, but "20 Days" was crushingly painful. You'll probably have trouble feeling good from it, although it's a valuable experience. Porcelain War has pain, but it's making a different point.

So, if you're looking to get some last films in, should you watch it? I think these are the three best films I've seen: Ibelin, Girls Will be Girls, and Porcelain War, with mothy Nocturnes as aftercare. You cannot make a bad choice between these three films. They're all lovely.

And the soundtrack—well I guess that's the point of these quick impressions. I'll come back to this and we'll actually look at the music in a full review. Pay attention if you watch this one.

Alright, more Sundance—as always, I will let you know when something is good!

☀️ Sundance 2024 Viewing Schedule:

25th Veni Vidi Vici 🎟️
25th Handling the Undead 🎟️
25th: Black Box Diaries review in progress
26th: In the Land of Brothers 🎟️
26th Ibelin 🎟️ <-- *****
26th Nocturnes 🎟️
27th: Girls Will be Girls
27th: Porcelain War 🎟️
A New Kind of Wilderness
Didi
Short Films

Awards:
Directing Award: U.S. Dramatic
U.S. Grand Jury Prize: Documentary
World Cinema Grand Jury Prize, Dramatic