Freedom on Fire | The Russian invasion in documentary

(Ottawa) It’s a story of bunkers.

One in Sumy, where comedians set up on a makeshift stage to cheer up a dark room filled with Ukrainians fleeing Russian bombardments.

One in Kharkiv, in an underground space where a chamber orchestra plays Vivaldi.

Another in Mariupol, in the bowels of the Azovstal steelworks, where Anna Zaïtseva spent more than two months with her toddler Svyatoslav, then 6 months old.

“I still have to hide his face so that he falls asleep, as I did to protect him from the falling pieces of ceiling,” says the young woman.

Born in Mariupol, where she taught French, Anna is in Canada for the promotional tour of the documentary Freedom on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom.

She is accompanied by journalist Natalia Nagorna, who is also starring in the film directed by Israeli-American filmmaker Evgeny Afineevsky.

Little Svyatoslav stayed in Berlin, where the family took refuge. Well, not the whole family: Anna hasn’t heard from her husband for six months.

She knows this because she saw him in a video on May 16: “It was the last time I saw him alive – in image”, she explains in the premises of the Embassy of Ukraine in Canada.

It is largely for him that she wanted to participate in the film of the director to whom we owe Winter on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedomavailable on Netflix.

“My husband and other fighters are still prisoners. The issue must be raised, especially since winter is coming, ”says the one who speaks impeccable French.

One win over another

The documentary – which actress Helen Mirren partly narrated – will be screened Thursday at the National Gallery of Canada in the presence of several dignitaries, including the Governor General of Canada, Mary Simon, as well as the Kyiv ambassador to Ottawa, Yulia Kovaliv.

He will then travel to the United States with his craftsmen, who must also take the opportunity to meet members of the American Congress.

And we’re hoping he gets nominated for the Oscars, like winter on fire before him, in 2016.

Despite her 20 years in the business, the TV journalist has been shaken by the coverage of the events of recent months.

In the documentary, we see her do it twice before succeeding in delivering a message of support to the Ukrainian troops, her blue eyes filled with tears.

“Remember in the shot just before, the soldier I was walking with? He had just been killed,” she said in an interview.

She was trying to say, “We’re waiting for you all to come back alive.” »

A medieval war

A few hours before the interview, we learned that Russian strikes had killed – again – in Kyiv, where Natalia Nagorna is from.

Cruise missiles also caused massive power and water cuts in the Ukrainian capital.

All this because Vladimir Putin claims to want to “denazify” the country, plagues the journalist.

“His goal is to destroy our people, our nation. Our children,” she breathes.

When Anna Zaitseva was finally evacuated from the Azovstal Steelworks, a maze of bunkers built during the Cold War, after 65 days, she had precisely that feeling.

“They tried to take away what was related to national symbols, for example my medallion with the Ukrainian trident,” she says.

A monogram also worn around the neck by Natalia Nagorna, according to whom the Russian army plunged the world back into the Middle Ages with its warlike methods.

“It’s a war of civilization. A war worthy of the Middle Ages,” she whispers.

Orcs and Oompa Loompas

In the depths of Sumy, even as Russian troops bogged down on the battlefield in Ukraine, comedian Ilya Glushenko fought back with words.

“We call the Russian army the Orcs, but that’s incorrect,” he blurted, drawing on his references from the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

“Orcs are scary. The Russian soldiers, they are like Oompa Loompas intoxicated with bath salts”, skinned the comedian in the bunker.