Oles Sanin is a laureate of Ukrainian and international festivals, and a director of documentaries and dramatic films. His movie “Mamai” arrived as the first seagull in contemporary Ukrainian cinema that broke out of the country. After Paradjanov’s and Dovzhennko’s masterpieces, which revealed Ukraine to the world in the last century, he has been the first to shoot and show to the public a worthy Ukrainian movie that was nominated for the Oscar. In addition, Oles is a prominent representative of the new generation of Ukrainians who believe in a better future for their country and do a lot to make it a reality. We are talking with Oles about Ukrainian cinema, and more.

– How do you assess the potential and prospects of Ukrainian cinema today, and what are your expectations in this respect?

– Ukrainians in their majority are a nation of optimists, therefore, I am optimistic about the Ukrainian cinema. Ukraine is a very convenient place for filmmaking. Our country has fantastic places, architecture, and climate. In a single filming session, you can shoot winter in the mountains, and then go down and shoot spring, the early blooming. We have a lot of interesting people, faces, and so many beautiful women. Ukrainians like to go to the cinema. For many, it is a pleasant pastime and leisure. People in Ukraine meet, fall in love and kiss each other in the movie theater. All this means that cinema has a good future in Ukraine. Now, the question is what kind of cinema we will have. Unfortunately, Ukraine does not resist the invasion of foreign products – American, French, German, Russian. I am not against foreign movies, but I am against trash movies. The domestic cinema is struggling for the right to exist and be successful. And I hope I have made some valuable contribution to this cause. Currently, new films are being made in the country and my colleagues – actors and film producers – show noticeable professional growth. Something worthwhile is taking shape now, and this supports my hopes for Ukrainian cinema. I try to help my colleagues. Many friends of mine wonder why I help my competitors. But I actually do not regard the people I work with for the same cause as competitors. For me, they are colleagues, and if some of them succeed, others will also benefit. I have a special attitude toward the people working in the film industry. It is a special environment that produces joy for people and this is what unites us.

– In your films, you often address historical subjects especially complex and painful for Ukraine. Is this dictated by your personal need or the need of the nation as you see it?

– I guess it comes from my personal need. So far, there is no topic for me, just like for my colleagues, which can be ordered by the government. Our governments change so fast that it is simply impossible to make a movie in such a short time. At times, external factors coincide with burning national issues, but the latter quickly pass, as a rule. Maybe we should thank God that we do not have such governmental orders. Instead, there is a social order. I feel it, like the desire of people to see their stories on the silver screen – dear, personally close, interesting, controversial, etc. It is very difficult for the film director to work when he has no personal motivation to make a movie and is only compelled to fulfill orders. If we talk about big dramatic and documentary projects, personal motivations are necessary. If you know this, feel it, suffer it, take interest in it, you film it. I remember watching one of the last interviews with Fellini, who spoke in Venice before a great number of critics and his younger colleagues. He was asked what inspired him to make such movies. Everyone expected to hear some nice words and stories. But he pondered for quite a while and said, “I don’t know… Maybe it was Juliet, but as far as I remember, it was the amount of my royalties.” Of course, he was probably joking. Cinema is actually about our stories and dreams.

– What projects are you are currently working on?

– Currently, I am making a movie titled “Flowers Have Eyes” which is referred to in the press as “Kobzars.” The director’s phase is almost over, to be succeeded with the preparation period of casting actors, selecting the camera crew, and shooting locations. The film is already living its own life and I like this. The characters have their story and they already act like real people. I see them in my dreams and I know what they should look like. This is a very important and pleasant period. It resembles the period when an expecting mother goes shopping and buys diapers… I am in the same mood now, being like a slightly strange expecting mother who is shopping, visualizing her newborn child. In such creative periods, it is not you who is waiting for the shooting; the film itself is waiting for you to shoot it.

– What is this film about?

– The events in the film unfold in the time of the NEP (New Economic Policy) in Ukraine and the Great Depression in the US. It is the story of an American boy who comes to Ukraine with his father. They intend to trade their tractor for grain, which is very cheap in Soviet Ukraine. But the father refuses the deal once he finds out that the grain is expropriated from the growers. The father dies and the body remains all alone and by accident meets a wandering musician – a Kobzar. He joins him and they travel Ukraine together. In the end, the boy becomes the witness of another historical event – a raid on a meeting of Kobzars in Kharkiv. This is a film about life and a helping hand extended to one another. I believe that Ukrainian openness and hospitality brought a whole generation of Ukrainians to having nothing to give their children to eat and knowing nothing of what would happen to them tomorrow. But Ukrainians have not turned into people full of hatred, seeking revenge on everyone around, taking everyone as an enemy… Quite the contrary, and I would like to make a movie about this trait of our national character.

– The Ukrainian press wrote about your joint project  with Mark Harris, a famous documentary maker. What is this project about?

– Our joint project is called “Perebizhchyk” (Deserter). This is the story of Volodymyr Kravchenko, a Soviet diplomat who became the world’s first dissident; a man who officially decided to never return to his motherland for political reasons. The plot is based on a trip of Volodymyr Kravchenko’s son, who undertook to follow the trail of his father better understand him and himself. It is a big documentary project. Mark and I are satisfied with this documentary. It is a positive example of the presence of the Ukrainian film industry in the global context. I think the opening screening will be held this late September-early October.

– Oles, are you asked about Ukraine abroad and has the content of such questions changed?

– The questions about Ukraine asked before 2003–2004 and those asked later are very different. At first, even foreign customs officers taking my passport showed a surprise and asked where this country was. In response to my joke that it was Northern Romania or Southern Mongolia, they said confidently, “Oh yes, I know.” That is, Ukraine did not exist on the mental map in the world. Now things have changed dramatically. Due to the intensive media coverage of the Orange Revolution, a lot of people have noticed our country. They are wondering, “Who are the Ukrainians? What do they look like? How do they live? What are their interests?” I believe we should work further to promote the brand of Ukraine. Of course, Ukraine means a perfect cuisine: borsch, varenyks, and salo. Ukraine is also pysankas, vyshyvankas, and sharovary. But not only that. There is a well-known saying: “Cinema is the face of a nation and cinematic language is the voice of its soul.” The world wants to see and recognize us, and I have great hope that the world will eventually recognize us through our cinema.