Skip to main content

Discover the winner of the Sundance Audience Award for World Cinema Documentary, and one of the most buzzed-about docs at this year’s Hot Docs Festival.

When Vladimir Putin announced a “special military operation” on February 24, 2022, Associated Press journalists Mystlav Chernov, Vasilisa Stepanenko and Evgeniy Maloletka headed immediately to Mariupol, the eastern Ukrainian city just 60 kilometres from the Russian border. They arrived to quiet streets just before the first bombs fell. No one would have believed the horror to come, and without their courageous work, no one could. As the only international reporters in the siege, they documented Russia’s actions. The images are extreme. Children are killed. A maternity hospital is destroyed. “This is painful to watch. But it must be painful to watch,” Chernov says. The inclusion of such graphic content becomes immediately understandable, however, as clips of Russian television are cut into the real-time horrors, claiming each foreign report is “fully staged” fake news. Winner of the Sundance Audience Award for World Cinema Documentary, this devastating war diary is required viewing. Film note by Hot Docs programmer Myrocia Watamaniuk.

In Ukranian and English with English subtitles.

This film screens with closed captions.

Tickets: $15 (Members from $10)

View our health & safety measures here.

Credits

  • Director(s)

    • Mstyslav Chernov

Get the latest from Hot Docs

Sign up for e-news and keep up to date with the latest from Hot Docs and Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema.
  • Advance notices about upcoming films
  • The latest on festival dates and tickets
  • Customize your preferences
  • Unsubscribe at any time
Sign up