Zhizn Ivanny

A snowstorm is shaking the walls of her nomadic dwelling made of reindeer hides. Fortunately, with some help from the neighbours Ivanna – single mother of five little children – manages to avert disaster. Out on the Yamal Penisula, existence is determined by nature. The children romp about. The adults toil, and when they go to Dudinka, the city, they do karaoke and drink till they drop – especially Gena, father of Ivanna's five kids, who isn't involved in raising them in any significant way. In his feature-length documentary debut, director Renato Borrayo Serrano, who studied with Marina Razbezhkina, among others, and contributed to the goEast programme three years ago with his short work Film for Carlos, takes the time to build an intimate relationship to Ivanna and her family, resulting in the portrait of a woman who never gives up hope, in spite of the rough fate that has shaped her character.  Now Ivanna has to choose: are her children going to grow up in the tundra like the Nenets or get a proper school education in the city? With its unique images, the film makes the chasm between indigenous culture and Russian majority society painfully obvious. (DOK.fest München)