Fri March 10 — 7 pm

Special Guest: Hell and Highwater Director Jeremy Williams

1 hr 40 min
Not rated/18+
Drama, Human rights & Social Justice

After Film Salon Hosted by Peg Campbell with guest Jeremy Williams

Personal and political turmoil face a serene camera in “Klondike,” a vision of the ongoing war in Donbass war that brooks no compromise in depicting the severe impact of the conflict on the region’s civilians — in particular, the innocent women to whom the film is dedicated.

Maryna Er Gorbach uses the real-life downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 in 2014 as a backdrop for a tale of courage and resistance. Irka (Oxana Cherkashyna) is seven months pregnant and living in the countryside with her partner Tolik (Sergiy Shadrin); as the film opens, they are facing the dilemma of whether or not to flee the area. The desperate, pliant Tolik wants safety above all, while Irka is reluctant to abandon the farm they call home. Caught between Russian separatists on one hand and the expectation of loyalty to Ukraine, the couple tries to balance the urgent, conflicting demands of civil war, and it’s no easy task.

Shot in elaborately choreographed long takes, Klondike is a feat of intricate staging, and Er Gorbach uses unity of space to illustrate the ever-growing divisions among her characters. Tense, haunting, and tragic, this is a truly powerful work of art.