Babylon'13

In 2014, Shakhta, Dancer, and Potter volunteered for the army in order to fight in the Russo-Ukrainian conflict in eastern Ukraine. Although the horrible things they experienced during two years on the front accompany them for every second of their existence, they try to return to civilian life. But the Russian invasion in 2022 forces them to again confront the war.

This lesson in political revelation focuses on the shooting down of the Malaysian passenger jet MH17 over eastern Ukraine in 2014. A meticulous, investigative exposé that lays bare the mechanisms of Russian warfare.

"Stronger than Arms", is the history that heats our hearts up with the memory of events and people, who from the time of Euromaidan to the war in the East were building a new Ukraine.

In 2014 Russia’s hybrid war against Ukraine turns hot. An engineer, actor, soccer coach and florist volunteer to fight on the front line. Unaware of the pivotal role they will play in the war, they discover the meaning of true leadership.

Between the Frames is the story of an exceptional relationship between a teacher and a young generation of actors brought up in his creative workshop. Five years after graduation from university, the main characters return to see themselves from the side and try to catch what is happening between the frames. The story is told by ex-students while they are watching behind-the-scenes archives of their student performance The Cabaret and reflecting upon the years that have passed. In the center of the story stands a teacher as a life-turning figure for each of the characters.

With the full-scale russian invasion of Ukraine, twelve-year-old Mykyta together with his parents and younger brother, had to flee their home in Vuhledar, a small mining town in Donetsk Oblast. Having settled at a new place, they put all their strength into resuming the operation of their main family work, a club for children who are interested in robotics and programming. While preparing for the main event, the World Robot Olympiad, Mykyta and his team partner Oleksii are going through a lot of trial and error. But despite everything, they actively move forward, proving that hard work towards your goal with a true passion for it can help you get through the most difficult times.

The film’s events take place on a single day: August 24, 2022, the day Ukraine celebrates the 31st anniversary of the renewal of independent statehood. The film combines places and people that best capture the country’s wartime spirit. The locations are: the relatively safe cities of Kyiv and Lviv; the cities under daily missile fire of Kharkiv and Mykolaiv; a trench at the frontlines near Donetsk; and the beaches of Odesa. The film presents a day in the life of a beach police patrol, a woman anti-tank missile operator, a water delivery driver, a mortar unit soldier, a rapid assault unit soldier, a 14-year-old pub janitor, an artist and a former member of parliament. Together, these people and places create an engaging mosaic of a day in the life of Ukraine.

The Ukrainian Revolution (2013-2014) and the war with Russia in the Donbas are nearing. The film deals with the history of the First Company of the Maidan, which defeated the enemy within and advanced to the frontlines to fight the external enemy. Immersion in the epicentre of events, a frank artistic and civilian view of human relationships against the background of violent social upheaval. Immutable human stories, the collision of charismatic characters, challenges and solutions on the verge of life and death, the search for interaction, the first steps towards the formation of civil society - All of this is summed up by an understanding of the way already travelled and an optimistic view of Ukraine's future.

In this haunting and visually inventive documentary, a spectral voice drifts through time and memory to trace the Maidan revolution and the roots of resistance in Ukraine.

This film, marking the 130th anniversary of Oleksandr Dovzhenko's birth, reveals the artist's controversial path—from his first attempts at cinema to the creation of masterpieces that became symbols of Ukrainian poetic cinema. The authors show his ability to maneuver between creative ambitions and the political demands of the era, remaining a unique figure in cultural history. 

The film tells the story of several volunteers, soldiers of the International Legion of the General Staff of the Unified Armed Forces, a unit called Ronin Team. During their service, the soldiers become true friends: they work, study and rest together. However, a time of trials for the courage and skills of the legionnaires comes. The hot summer months are not easy for them. And not all recruits can withstand the high pace of training and service. Meanwhile, troubling news of the Russian offensive comes from the front.

This film plays out in Ukraine on a single day: March 14, 2022, the 2,944th day of the Russian-Ukrainian War. In the last few weeks, intense warfare has surreally mixed places and people and created a post-apocalyptic dimension revealing new qualities and roles. Thousands of Kyivans have moved to live in subway stations. The capital city's previously calm suburbs have been transformed into battle zones of destruction and looting by Russian occupiers. People no longer live according to "workdays" or "weekends," counting instead the number of days since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine... The film presents this day in the lives of a pop music star, video engineer, historian, art restorer, polar researcher, and pensioner, who were all forced to radically change their lives.

Dmytro Kozatsky with the call sign "Orest", head of the press service of the Azov Battalion (Azov Regiment), has been at the Metallurgical Combine Azovstal since the beginning of the siege of Mariupol by the Russian military after their invasion of Ukraine. On the eve of his exit from the shattered factory, he made a farewell film.

During the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in the spring of 2022, Russian troops occupied the suburbs of the capital for more than a month. This film is dedicated to the educators of the Kyiv region, who did not despair even under shelling, enemy control, and the constant threat to their lives. The viewer will travel through the educational institutions of Hostomel, Irpin, Bucha and Vorzel, to become acquainted with those, who hold, and will be holding in their hands the future of our country.

Captured during the events of Euromaidan revolution in Kyiv, Ukraine, an expressive argument looks like something out of the movie by Sergio Leone. Short documentary sketch by Babylon 13. As per Babylon'13 tradition, no filmmakers were initially credited for the short piece, although following festival screenings and awards identified Dmytro Sukholytkyy-Sobchuk as the filmmaker behind it.

The artists Zhanna Kadyrova and Denys Ruban spent two weeks in the basement of their house, fleeing from the rocket attacks and sabotage groups of the occupiers that were flooding the outskirts of Kyiv at the time, and then decided to evacuate to western Ukraine. Local residents of one of the Zakarpattia villages sheltered them in a picturesque house on a hillside, next to a river. Doing what you know and love for the benefit of Ukraine is the best thing an artist can do in times of war. This is how the Palianytsia project was born - a series of objects made of stones cut by a mountain river. Zhanna sells them to patrons and galleries and uses the proceeds to buy bulletproof vests, radios, thermal imagers and other things our soldiers need. Before she sends her ‘loaves’ to Venice for the Biennale, Zhanna holds an exhibition in the village where she now lives, so that the people who have taken her in can be the first to see her art.

Oleh "Simon" Krisenko is a guy from Mykolaiv who went to war in 2014. In civilian life, he was an actor and played in a children's theater. In 2014, when the war started, he immediately joined a volunteer battalion. We filmed Simon during his service in the regiment in 2015, 2016, and 2017. Together with other defenders of Mariupol, he ended up at Azovstal and then in captivity. In May 2023, Simon returned home after a year in Russian captivity. He is currently undergoing rehabilitation. He is actively involved in campaigns and support for the families of prisoners and wounded.

Roma was working in London when the Ukrainian conflict rapidly escalated with Russia’s army rolling across the border of his home. He decides to return to his family, whose town soon becomes a battlefield. While they take shelter in basements, cut off from the rest of their country, Roma joins an air intelligence unit, operating drones to locate the whereabouts of the invading force. As the drone flies, Roma is so close to his family, but in reality, the gulf between them is enormous.

Personal videos from the phones, camcorders, cameras and GoPros of Ukrainian soldiers are woven into a surreal journey to the frontline of the war with Russia. The film shows a bizarre world whose laws are quite different from what we are used to. The behaviour is different, the relationships unfold differently and the humour takes on different notes. The heroes wake up and fall asleep, rejoice and cry, always feeling that the recording may end at any moment.

From the beginning of the siege of Azovstal by the Russians the director had conversations with soldiers of the Azov Regiment, revealing their portraits. This film is dedicated to Dmytro Kozatsky with the call sign "Orest". Orest is a former liaison officer and head of the Azov Regiment's press service in Mariupol. Orest has been covering the world situation in Mariupol and at Azovstal since the beginning of the Russian invasion, and was in captivity at the time of the film's release.