Oleh Sentsov meets Czech President

Oleh Sentsov (right) meets Czech President Petr Pavel (left).

Courtesy of Georg Szalai

On Sunday, world politics took center stage in the Czech spa town of Karlovy Vary. Ukrainian filmmaker Oleh Sentsov presented his documentary Real from the trenches of the Ukrainian war at the 58th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. Before that, however, he met with Czech President Petr Pavel, who assured Ukraine of the Czech Republic’s support against the Russian invasion.

Sentsov, who is on leave from his work as a soldier in the war, was warmly welcomed and received great applause at the festival’s opening ceremony on Friday evening. The Sunday premiere of Real The Hotel Thermal in Karlovy Vary was full.

The entire 90 minutes Real is played in a single, unedited cut, with the audience seeing everything through Sentsov’s eyes, via a GoPro camera attached to his helmet in the trenches of war. Sentsov makes repeated calls between units and headquarters, speaking to his men gathered around him, trying to organize the evacuation of troops under fire and resupply of his unit as Russian forces close in.

Realwhose title derives from the code name of the operation, was produced by Arthouse Traffic and Cry Cinema in Ukraine, together 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.