Documentary Cinema of the 2000s: Films by Maksym Surkov, Presented by Producer Svitlana Zinovieva
On November 25 at 18:30, Jam Factory Art Center will screen two documentary shorts by Maksym Surkov: On the Marshes and Others.
Life amid the marshes of Polissia and a mother and child’s journey to Lithuania — these films explore different experiences of life, loneliness, and engagement with the world.
The films will be introduced by their producer, Svitlana Zinovieva, a cinematographer, screenwriter, and founder of Inspiration Films.
Programme
On the Marshes (2003)
Director: Maksym Surkov
Country: Ukraine
Studio: Inspiration Films
Producer: Svitlana Zinovieva
Runtime: 23 minutes
A surreal yet entirely documentary portrait of Stare Selo, a village isolated from the world by impassable roads, poverty, forests, and the marshes of Polissia. Its only source of income is cranberries.
From early autumn until the first snow, residents set out on long expeditions, gathering berries during the day and spending their nights around fires in makeshift shelters. Despite the apparent self-sufficiency of village life, their routines and livelihoods depend entirely on the harvest. The film observes people whose lives follow the rhythms of the marshes, revealing loneliness, sorrow, and inner strength beneath their daily work.
Others (2005)
Director: Maksym Surkov
Country: Ukraine
Studio: Inspiration Films
Producer: Svitlana Zinovieva
Runtime: 26 minutes
The film follows an autistic boy who travels with his mother to Lithuania to attend a course of dolphin therapy at the Klaipėda Dolphinarium. Through their journey, it explores difference and the possibility of understanding between people who experience the world in different ways.
Total running time of the films: 49 minutes.
About the Guest
Svitlana Zinovieva is a Ukrainian cinematographer, producer, and screenwriter. She graduated from the cinematography department of the Ivan Karpenko-Karyi Kyiv Theatre Institute, where she studied under Suren Shakhbazian. She worked at the Odesa Film Studio and Kyivnaukfilm, serving as director of photography on seven fiction films and approximately thirty documentaries.
An independent producer since 1993, she founded Inspiration Films in 2002. She has produced around forty documentaries presented at international festivals, including FIDMarseille, the Krakow Film Festival, and Molodist.
She is a co-founder and co-curator of the Close Up Documentary Film Club, a member of the National Union of Cinematographers of Ukraine and the Ukrainian Film Academy, and a recipient of the 2017 Ivan Mykolaichuk Award.
The screening is part of “The History of Cinema in Ukraine” programme.
📅 November 25 | 18:30
📍 Jam Factory Art Center, Auditorium
124 B. Khmelnytskoho St., Lviv
🎟 Admission is free with advance registration