2000 Meters to Andriivka

Time Out

3 days ago

While most directors fret over final cuts and spiralling budgets, it's more likely to be exploding mortar shells and buzzing drones that keep Ukrainian filmmaker-reporter Mstyslav Chernov awake at night.
Fresh from winning a Best Documentary Oscar for 20 Days in Mariupol, a fly-on-the-shattered-wall depiction of the brutal 2022 siege by Putin's invading army, the insanely brave journalist-filmmaker has picked up his camera and found somewhere even more dangerous to go.
That place? A pencil-thin strip of blasted forest just outside the destroyed village of Andriivka in eastern Ukraine. The fields on both sides are sewn with landmines, making the task of capturing the village a forest crawl of hidden Russian bunkers, random shellfire and sudden death. It's a trench-by-trench battle as brutal as Okinawa or the Somme, and Chernov and his Associate Press colleague Alex Babenko are right there with the Ukrainian assault brigade assigned to the task.
Its vérité view of combat is intense and confronting. What makes it so impactful is the first-person nature of the footage – suddenly, the tools of modern warfare have become filmmaking tools too. Footage from soldiers' bodycams and aerial photography from reconnaissance drones puts you right in the shoes of the men – sometimes even as they fall, wounded. The result is disorientating, distressing and often surreal. It'd feel like Call of Duty if it wasn't so grimly real.
Alex Garland's Warfare suffers by comparison
Of course, there's an element of propaganda here – this is a documentary guaranteed to stiffen a nation's resolve and win sympathy overseas. But Chernov's quest for clarity transcends love of country, and there's a sense of pessimism about what lies ahead for his country that makes the tone more melancholy than triumphalist. There's also a note of anger at the patronising tone of the western media in its coverage of the Ukrainian war effort. Audio clips of dismissive European and US news media reports are overlaid on combat footage as the unit's casualties mount up.
2000 Meters to Andriivka does a stunning job of bringing humanity to its combatants – an extraordinarily brave and determined bunch. (Alex Garland's Warfare suffers by comparison with the deeper characterisation yielded by Chernov's footage.) As the men slog towards their objective – 200 metres… 150 metres… 100 metres – there are lulls that give these proud men time to reflect on their fight for homes and families. The enemy is just 'the motherfuckers'. One new recruit asks not to be filmed, because 'I haven't done anything heroic yet'. Taking cover in a foxhole as mortar rounds land nearby, Chernov offers the recruit a roll-up as the man shares his post-war resolutions. He won't live long enough to see them through.
A groundbreaking view of the horror and pity of war, I can't remember a cinematic experience quite like it. It's devastating and extraordinary.