Interview with Oleh Sentsov about the Ukraine war film “Real”: KVIFF

Oleh Sentsov’s Ukraine war documentary “Real”.

Courtesy of Karlovy Vary International Film Festival

20 days in MariupolMstyslav Chernov’s harrowing, Oscar-winning documentary about the siege of the Ukrainian port city in the first days of the large-scale Russian invasion revealed the devastation the war caused to the civilian population. A new documentary, Realwhich premiered at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, shows the reality of the Ukraine war from the perspective of a soldier.

Real begins without explanation or warning. Suddenly we find ourselves in a trench and hear over the radio the desperate voice of a soldier in another trench who is being attacked by Russian troops and urgently needs reinforcements. The voice on our side – that of Real Director Oleh Sentsov, call sign “Grunt” – is trying to organize the evacuation of the troops under fire and the resupply of his unit. Ammunition is running low and the Russian forces – uniformly referred to on the radio as “F**kers” – are closing in.

The entire film runs in a single, unedited cut, an hour and a half long, as Sentsov repeatedly makes calls between units and headquarters, talking to his men gathered around him, trying to penetrate the fog of war and help the soldiers before it’s too late. We see everything through Sentsov’s eyes, via a GoPro camera attached to his helmet.

Sentsov joined the Ukrainian Defense Forces shortly after Russia’s large-scale invasion in February 2022. The award-winning director of player (2011), Pay (2020) and rhino (2021) had been using his camera in the fight against Russia for nearly a decade. Sentsov was arrested by Russian forces in Crimea in 2014 for protesting Moscow’s annexation of the region and sentenced to 20 years for terror planning. He spent five years in a Russian prison before being finally released in a Ukrainian-Russian prisoner exchange on September 7, 2019, thanks to a coordinated action by the European Film Academy, Amnesty International and the European Parliament, with the help of directors such as Ken Loach, Pedro Almodóvar and Agnieszka Holland.

The events in Realtook place in the summer of 2023, when Sentsov’s unit took part in the Ukrainian counteroffensive, the goal of which was to break through the Russian front line and push the troops east and out of the country. The attack failed.

The title of the film is derived from the code name of the operation. The film was produced by Arthouse Traffic and Cry Cinema in Ukraine, along with co-producers Propeler Film in Croatia and Downey Ink in the UK, with Sentsov, Denis Ivanov, Mike Downey, Boris T. Matić and Lana Matić as producers.

On leave from the front, Sentsov spoke with The Hollywood Reporter about the unheroic reality in the trenches, the problems of war “that we do not discuss in Ukraine,” and why he believes victory is still many, many years away.

What were your expectations when you first went to the front to fight for your country over two years ago?

There is a big difference between thinking about war and being on the front lines. It is completely different when you are on the front lines and the enemy is coming at you. Basically, the front lines, the Russian forces, were right across the street from where I lived. When the Russians were driven out of Kiev and the front lines were pushed back, I went east and south to try to drive them out of Ukraine. But I did not have good expectations, because there is nothing good about war. Nothing good at all.

Your film, Realshows a real-time snapshot of a military operation, a Ukrainian offensive, that goes completely wrong. What happened the day before the action we see on the screen?

This is one of those very long days. It was part of the much anticipated Ukrainian counteroffensive last summer. We had spent almost ten days trying to break through the Russian defense line. We lost equipment, we lost weapons. But we were still in the same place. It was quite obvious that we lost a lot of people, weapons, vehicles, everything. But even at that moment we still believed that we could do something. Our commander sent us two kilometers deep to break through the Russian line. I cannot call this operation successful, but I cannot say whether what we were asked to do was right or not. We are just soldiers and we did what we were ordered to do.

As a commander, I was the first to take my people into that trench, kilometers behind the front line. I retreated to get more people and more help. But on the way back, our BMP (armored personnel carrier) was fired upon by Russians and we got stuck in our position. All our attacks from the flank were unsuccessful, so our people were cut off from any logistics, from any communication, from any supplies. You have to understand: they were almost completely surrounded by enemies, and I was the only one who had a connection with them and could report to the higher commanders. The people in the trenches had no direct connection to the headquarters, but I was stationed a little higher up and could communicate with both the headquarters and the people in the trenches.

What you see in the film starts at around 9:00/9:30 (and lasts 1.5 hours). But the fight started at 4:00 and ended around 8:00.

Why did you record this, why did you want to show this?

Well, I didn’t want to make this film. I always have this GoPro camera on my helmet, but I’m always busy on the front lines doing other stuff, so I don’t record anything. That day, it was very chaotic and basically I was fixing my helmet and just touched the camera to see if it was still there and accidentally turned it on. I didn’t realize it was recording. Six months later, I went through the memory card and saw this big file and opened it. At first I thought it looked very random, I thought no one would care and I wanted to delete it. But then I started watching it and I realized, oh my God, this is part of this very tragic event, with so many people in the trenches, cut off and surrounded by Russians. Our friends, my friends. The people who see the film may never see these soldiers and these situations, but they can experience how tragic it was. They can see one of the most tragic days of the Ukrainian counteroffensive.

That’s why I don’t call this a film or even a documentary, but a pure document. This is the video document that shows a part of the war, a very small glimpse of the war. But this war document caught on camera really shows us how cruel, how stupid and – I don’t have the words to describe it – how senseless war is.

Who do you think should see this document?

I hope this film will be of interest to anyone interested in the Ukraine war. You get a very different perception of war if you only know it from war films or documentaries that are edited to make the war look presentable. There is always this component of heroism, everyone wants to emphasize that, show dynamic, heroic actions. But real war is very, very different. My idea and my goal was to show the real war, the real people right in front of me in that moment. I call it an immersive experience: you are thrown into it and only slowly begin to understand what is going on. It really draws you into the trenches and helps you feel what it is like to be there.

I remember seeing the movie when I was young Train by Oliver Stone, and there’s a scene where one of the soldiers says, “Forget the word hero. There’s nothing heroic in war.” I couldn’t really understand that at the time, because I grew up watching very different movies that gave a very different perception of war. Now, after two and a half years in an active war zone, I have to say that I completely agree with the young man in the movie and with Oliver Stone, who tried to show a long time ago that there are no heroes in war. There is only war. The word hero is usually associated with some stupid, unnecessary actions that can cause terrible harm. As soldiers, we are simply trying to do our job as best as we can to protect lives and achieve victory.

From the outside, it’s hard to understand what’s happening on the ground. We’ve seen efforts to increase support for Ukraine, such as the G7’s pledge to provide an additional $50 billion in aid, or Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s passage of the new mobilization law to bring more troops into the country. What do you think is needed to end this war?

I think we probably need another hour or two to discuss these issues. I want to be completely honest. There are many things about the situation, about the reality of the war, that we are not discussing here in Ukraine. I think that is very problematic and, frankly, I think that this war will continue for many years to come.

At the beginning of the large-scale invasion, many people thought the war would be over in two or three weeks. I gave an interview at the time where I said it would last at least two to three years, and everyone was angry with me. If you look at the situation today, we have been in this large-scale war for two and a half years and we do not see an end. If someone asked me how long it will take to restore control over the 1991 borders and defeat Russia militarily, I would say maybe it could happen in 10 years, but that would be a miracle.

Not the best prognosis.

We must face the truth, however painful it may be. Otherwise, we will spend our whole lives in an illusion that has no connection with reality, with the real situation that lies before us.

Interview translated from Ukrainian.

Here you can watch the trailer for Real below.