We know from headlines that small-scale technologies such as drones have transformed war, most urgently affecting Ukraine\u2019s ability to stay in a bruising battle for its existence against Russia. But it\u2019s done the same for covering war too, especially the kind of fleet, up-close dispatch of which we can now say Ukrainian filmmaker Mstyslav Chernov is a master.<\/p>\n
The Associated Press correspondent\u2019s follow-up to his harrowing, Oscar-winning \u201c20 Days in Mariupol,\u201d<\/a> which rendered the first weeks of Russia\u2019s invasion inside a city under siege, is another intimate perspective on his country\u2019s devastation. But this time it\u2019s from the frontlines of Ukraine\u2019s 2023 counteroffensive<\/a>, specifically one brigade\u2019s nightmarish trek to liberate a Russian-occupied town. In its heart-stopping intimacy \u2014 courtesy of helmet-cams, drones and the foxhole connection between citizen soldier and countryman journalist \u2014 \u201c2000 Meters to Andriivka\u201d is a war chronicle like no other.<\/p>\n Right away, Chernov introduces us to war\u2019s chaos with bodycam footage from a Ukrainian soldier named Piro. It\u2019s a dugout POV capturing how a lull marked by jokes and cigarettes can quickly become enemy fire, screaming and artillery shells flying. A retreat is abandoned when the platoon\u2019s armored carrier gets stuck. In the ensuing scramble, comrades are hit and we hear a resigned, \u201cThat\u2019s it for me.\u201d Suddenly this view feels less like one from a trench but a grave.<\/p>\n No wonder Chernov\u2019s measured narration sounds bleaker. His speculative dread from \u201cMariupol\u201d has been replaced by a fact-driven weariness. He and AP colleague Alex Babenko press on, embedding themselves in a battalion tasked with a one-mile push to retake the town of Andriivka near a Russian stronghold. The path, however, is a thin ribbon of forest hiding Russians in trenches, fortified on each side by open minefields.<\/p>\n Also, the designation \u201cforest\u201d seems generous: The gnarled and stripped trees look broken, suggesting an open wasteland instead of a battleground that could provide cover. They\u2019ve clearly already seen plenty of destruction, and by the end of the film, they\u2019ll have seen more. Chernov tells us that one soldier described this unrecognizable homeland to him as like \u201clanding on a planet where everything is trying to kill you.\u201d<\/p>\n The first-person footage as the group advances is breathless and dense with gunfire, yelling and the sense that each inch will be hard-won on the way to planting that Ukrainian flag in Andriivka, which, from drone shots, already looks decimated. (The film is broken into chapters indicating meters gained.) \u201cI came to fight, not to serve,\u201d says this brigade\u2019s war dog of a leader, a former warehouse worker named Fedya who at one point is shot but makes his way back to the mission after being evacuated for treatment.<\/p>\n Still, during long foxhole waits, when the only visible smoke is from a cigarette, Chernov\u2019s gentle off-camera queries to Fedya\u2019s men (ranging from the hopelessly young to a 40-something new grandfather) elicit touching optimism for a return to normal life: a shower, a job, friendly rivalries over trivial matters, the chance to smoke less, to fix a toilet back home, to rebuild. Then Chernov\u2019s voiceover comes in for the softly spoken hammer-blow peek into the future: which of these guys will die in later battles or perhaps never be found. This is gutting stuff.<\/p>\n There\u2019s never been as immersive a war documentary as \u201c2000 Meters in Andriivka,\u201d cleaving as it does to the swings between peril and blessed boredom, mixing overhead shots (including a suicide drone\u2019s vantage) and underground views like a dystopian saga. War is hell, but Ukraine\u2019s survival is paramount. The senselessness, however, seems a constant. \u201cWhy are you here?\u201d a Ukrainian soldier barks at a captured Russian, who mutters back, \u201cI don\u2019t know why we\u2019re here.\u201d<\/p>\n ‘2000 Meters to Andriivka’<\/p>\n In Ukrainian and English, with subtitles<\/p>\n Not rated<\/p>\n Running time:<\/b> 1 hour, 48 minutes<\/p>\n Playing: <\/b>Opens Friday, Aug. 1 at Laemmle Monica<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We know from headlines that small-scale technologies such as drones have transformed war, most urgently affecting Ukraine\u2019s ability…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":315203,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7654],"tags":[114825,114826,20370,114829,31239,2000,299,114828,22787,16188,2736,76850,114827,332,31917,657,771],"class_list":{"0":"post-315202","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ukraine","8":"tag-andriivka","9":"tag-chernov","10":"tag-cigarette","11":"tag-citizen-soldier","12":"tag-drone","13":"tag-eu","14":"tag-europe","15":"tag-fedya","16":"tag-forest","17":"tag-frontline","18":"tag-mariupol","19":"tag-meters","20":"tag-pummeling-dispatch","21":"tag-russia","22":"tag-town","23":"tag-ukraine","24":"tag-war"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114966256995502075","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/315202","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=315202"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/315202\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/315203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=315202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=315202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=315202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}