Ukrainian Newsreel and Documentary Film Studio

The first film made following the nuclear meltdown accident at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant, reactor 4, near Pripyat, Ukrainian SSR, Soviet Union, on the 26 April 1986, focuses on the immediate aftermath of the disaster and the cleanup effort.

About the world champion and record holder in pole vaulting, Honored Master of Sports of the USSR Serhii Bubka, who set four world records in one season. His family and coach, Honored Coach of the USSR V.O. Petrov tell about the athlete.

About the teacher of Cherkasy Music School No. 1, the head of the Ecology Society, S. Silkin, giving an interview at an environmental rally during a lesson.

The film is dedicated to the problems of rational use of land resources. The film shows the Avangard collective farm in Chernihiv Oblast and the Michurin collective farm in Sumy Oblast. Doctors of Agricultural Sciences V. Medvedev, O. Tararyko, and Doctor of Economics V. Shepa are interviewed.

Documentary about the famous Ukrainian philosopher and poet Hryhoriy Skovoroda, which was banned by Soviet censorship. The film only reached the screens 15 years later, during Perestroika era.

About the director of the Kyiv Evening Music School, A. Lupashko. The director talks about the problems of the school, which is facing closure.

About the celebration of the Day of Kyiv. The head of the executive committee of the Kyiv City Council V. Zgursky, writers S. Yovenko and V. Brovchenko are shown.

About A. Luponos, a resident of the village of Monastyryshche, Cherkasy region, who was persecuted for his political views and forcibly placed in a psychiatric hospital: with his family at the maternity hospital, at his father's grave in Kyiv.

The film is about Ivan Honchar, an ardent collector of Ukrainian antiquities, who turned his Kyiv apartment into a unique museum.

The Soviet authorities tried in every possible way to hide the truth about the shootings in Babyn Yar, because the victims there were mostly Jews. In 1966, on the eve of the 25th anniversary of the shootings, for the first time a small group of Kyivans, together with the famous writer Viktor Nekrasov, gathered near Babyn Yar to honor the memory of the victims. Employees of the Kyiv Documentary Film Studio found out about it: cameraman Eduard Timlin and director Rafail Nakhmanovych. Under the guise of shooting a film about the Soviet police, they decided to record this event on tape.

The film is dedicated to the memory of the victims of Babyn Yar. A memorial service and a requiem rally are shown. The writer I. F. Drach makes a speech. Photo and film documents from the Second World War are used.

Women of Ukraine of the 20th century — residents of villages, collective farms, and cities of the Soviet republic — talk about themselves. The context of the great story is revealed through tragic, not at all bookish, first-person narratives and documentary footage of menial labor in the fields and construction sites.

Documentary about the problems of lonely old age of pensioners of Chornobayiv District, Cherkasy Oblast, Ukraine; pensioners give interviews during household work.

The film is about the service of border guards at one of the outposts of the Western Border District: soldiers on guard duty, during their leisure time, see off demobilized soldiers.

A touching cinematic portrait of a woman who survived the 1933 Holodomor and whose life comprised more dramatic moments than a screenwriter could possibly describe. This is one of the first films raising the issue of the Great Famine.

Reflection on the way the Soviet production system turns workers themselves into commodities.

In November 1988, director Anatoly Syrykh met with Sergei Parajanov in Tbilisi to make a documentary about him. However, Parajanov was clearly not in the mood to talk about his art. As a compromise, Syrykh offers to talk about the artist and time. The tired, offended director of "Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors" forbids Syrykh to film him. He agrees only to speak, recalling the most unpleasant moments of his life.