A Ukrainian film about the writers of the Executed Renaissance has been released

Film House of the Word. The endless novel, which has been in the works for more than ten years, has already become an event for Ukrainian cinema.

On May 9, the full-length feature film House of Slovo was released in Ukrainian theaters. An endless novel by Ukrainian director Taras Tomenko.

It is a continuation of the director’s previous work – the documentary film Dom Slovo, which in 2018 received the Ukrainian national film award Golden Top in the category Best Documentary Film.

The plot of the film develops in the twentieth century, when the Soviet authorities built the Slovo cooperative house, into which the most prominent Ukrainian writers settled. But large, spacious apartments, comfortable conditions and the opportunity to simply create turned out to be a trap, guarding the lives of artists. The residents of the “crematorium” house, as the writer Ivan Bagryany called it, became participants in the Soviet experiment and the generation of the Executed Renaissance.

According to the director’s plan, the outstanding classics of Ukrainian literature appear before the viewer not as strict figures from the pages of books, but as living, sincere, emotional personalities.

The main characters in the film were played by Dmitry Oleynik, Vyacheslav Dovzhenko, Nina Naboka, Marina Koshkina and Stanislav Suknenko. According to the director, they worked on the film’s script for more than 10 years, and Ukrainian writer Lyubov Yakimchuk helped write it.

“This is a long and difficult road to the return of the writers of the Executed Renaissance from oblivion. A fascinating script, verified by a documentary film, an incredible cast, exquisite cinematography, the crazy atmosphere of the 1920-1930s, the heyday of avant-garde art – all from the father. years ago, so that we could see the present in the bloody meat grinder of the Russian horde. It is important for me that my film is being released right now, at a fateful time for Ukraine. Words,” Taras Tomenko commented on the film’s release at its pre-premiere screening.