Vavilon XX

Undoubtedly a poetically narrated story of a Ukrainian village on the border of two eras. However, the construction of a collective commune is only one element in the background of the fate of the village residents, whose lives are often portrayed with a considerable amount of perspective and humor. It is precisely the characters that form the backbone of the film, of whom at least the main two are not at all unequivocally/flatly depicted. (For me), the only unfortunate aspect is that in the second third of the film, it becomes predominantly a more cheerful portrayal of the idiosyncratic inhabitants of Babylon, which somewhat weakens the cruel (but still poetic, which is not mutually exclusive!) ending. Ukrainian films, in any case, are often built on the connection between the harsh and the beautiful, the cruel and the human. Examples can be the aforementioned Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors (1964) /in which Ivan Mykolaichuk played the main role/ and The Stone Cross (1968) /in which both Mykolaichuk and B. Brondukov starred/ where it is obvious that these films have not only a similar style but also evident actor continuity. (15.04.2014)