This is the fifth year that fans of documentary cinema can attend the events of the Traveling Docudays UA in the cities and villages of Kirovohrad region.

“I can’t believe that this is the fifth festival we’ve organized. It seems as if we started to organize screenings, chose the proper projector, screen and other equipment only yesterday. The first year, 95 percent of screenings took place in the district center, in the town of Kompaniyivka. And already then we decided that we needed to organize most of the screenings in the villages of the district, because village residents are in unequal position compared to town residents, they don’t have the same choice of leisure activities as city residents, and don’t have access to relevant knowledge and cultural events,” say the festival’s regional coordinators.

The audience in Kompaniyivka were the most alarmed and outraged by the film Born to Be Free (directed by Gayane Petrosyan). They admitted that they never even thought about how wild animals are captured, kept and trained. And what do we teach our children and grandchildren when we take them to the circus or to the zoo? The film made people think, Don’t we lose our humanity when we only care about making money and material wealth?

In the village of Zhyvanivka, the viewers sincerely sympathized with the protagonist of the film The Winter Garden’s Tale (directed by Semen Mozgovy), but in the end they reached the conclusion that a person with 45 years of work experience deserves a rest. A similarly beloved place in their village was the lake, which has now dried out, but local activists now are taking care of it and look for ways to restore it.

In Vynohradivka, the audience turned out to be rather interesting; mothers came with their children. So we faced a difficult decision — what to show in order to make everyone interested and turn them into new documentary fans? We decided that we should not deviate from our screening program, but still find something interesting for the children. So we screened the film These Objects, Those Memories (directed by Roger Horn) for the adults, and Alfredo (directed by Maaike van der Linden and Marye Hoebe) for the children.

The audience liked both films, and they enjoyed discussing what they had seen. It turned out that everyone in the room had some items they would never abandon. Many locals have to travel abroad to work, just as the protagonists of the film These Objects, Those Memories. People admit that it is very difficult to realize their rights to dignified conditions of life and labor.

After watching Alfredo, children spoke about their dreams, about what they do in order to implement them. The young viewers admitted that they should learn persistence, patience and industriousness from Alfredo. We had already shown this film to students, so it has collected many good reviews. Young viewers express their confidence that Alfredo will definitely become the world champion in stage magic.

In Vodiane, we screened the film In Another World (directed by Anna Bedynska), and in Chervona Sloboda, the film My Daughter Nora (directed by Jasna Krajinovic).

We also organized screenings for high school and university students in schools, so the young audience watched the films Diary (directed by Oleksandra Chuprina), Altimir (directed by Kay Hannahan), Home Games (directed by Alisa Kovalenko), Rock’n’Rollers (directed by Daan Bol), Paper Stars (directed by Inna Omelchenko) and Alfredo (directed by Maaike van der Linden and Marye Hoebe).

We can attest that despite the lack of heating in village culture institutions, despite the decrepit condition of the venues, despite the long hard commuting because of disrepaired roads, the films of the Traveling Docudays UA reach their target audience, they are watched in village clubs, libraries and schools of Kirovohrad region, and this year also in the Alabama cafe in Smoline.

This year, our audience watched and discussed 21 films, and each of them received many positive reviews.

The adult visitors also pointed out the truthfulness and relevance of the films. They spoke with sorrow about human rights violations and about how difficult it is to protect and realize your rights. Big discussions were provoked by the films Home Games, Rakijada, and The World We Live In: Wandering Workers in Germany. Thanks to cinema, people learn to evaluate the actions of documentary film protagonists, as well as their own, in terms of human rights.

Photo credit: Yevheniy Kiriyenko

The organizers of the festival in Kirovohrad region is the NGO Successful Interaction.