Taras TOMENKO: “The cinema need not give final answers”

Taras Tomenko is 25 and in the fifth year at the Cinematography Department of Kyiv’s Theatrical Institute. He entered the institute after quitting Taras Shevchenko University’s Philology Department. While at the institute, he made two shorts, Biynia [Slaughterhouse] and Tyr [Shooting Gallery] surprising the audience by a severe, mature, and uncompromising approach.

Not long ago, Taras again surprised many in his native land when his ten minute Tyr which was presented at the International Forum of Young Cinema in Berlin, in the Short Film Panorama, won the prestigious New York Cinema School award . The award entitled him to training at the famous school. The critical Areopagus was impressed by his “image of childhood in black and white.” Tyr is a simple yet frightening story about a homeless child (played by a real homeless boy by the name of Pylyp Dobriansky) spending nights in basements, peeping at a ballerina through the window, dreaming of winning a million by showing marksmanship at the shooting gallery. Yet when he does hit the target he receives nothing save a handful of cigarette butts from the sneering old man running the gallery. And then the boy sets out after another target, the old man.

Despite the gaudy formulations accompanying the awards ceremony in Berlin (“a raw poetical film building an intense image of the young hero, owing to the dramatic usage of light and shadow”; “the shooting gallery becomes a symbolic space for hopes, dreams, and desperate desires cherished by a street boy”), the jury’s reasoning is quite clear. Tomenko succeeded in not only constructing a shocking story, but also creating a special visual atmosphere, conveying the world as seen by the main hero, vulnerable and aggressive precisely because of his being so vulnerable. This is probably what helped our student conquer Berlin; imitating literature by telling stories, Tyr shows, conveys a story through screen images.

What follows is an interview with Taras Tomenko, a student who, despite today’s highly unfavorable conditions, has not only managed to produce a good film, but also conveyed his creative message to far off and satiated Europe.

The Day: How did it feel receiving the award? Were you surprised?

T. T. : I was euphoric at first, of course. In fact, subconsciously, after they invited me to the festival, I knew I would win. Perhaps because I’d decided not to stop halfway or maybe my stars were aligned that way. Anyway, I think someone must’ve planned this event in my life.

The Day: How was it working on Tyr?

T. T. : The first day of location shooting coincided with the solar eclipse. The scene in the middle of the film, with the boy breathing glue, was precisely during the eclipse, which explains the shimmering light. We finished work sometime in October, on the eve of the Molodist Festival. So it took us over a year.

The Day: A ten-minute film and more than a year of working on it?

T. T. : That’s right. And it was backbreaking work.

The Day: What made it so hard?

T. T.: Casting in the first place. Then the script, revising and polishing the dramatic composition, and the organizational work, of course. Primary was the lack of funds. The film is perfectly budget-free. We had no transport, carrying all the equipment ourselves. Besides, we re-edited the footage twelve times or more, putting in the finishing touches in terms of rhythm. And making the soundtrack was very difficult, considering the devastated studio equipment. Well, we survived and made the film.

The Day: Where did you find the boy?

T. T. : In the street. His name is Pylyp Dobriansky, he is twelve and homeless since six. He has two grades in school; he ran away from every school they put him in. We are now working to get him enrolled in a group home. I’m not sure it will work, because he has spent half his life in the street. He’s in his element there. What is horrible for us adults is routine to him. But he must not be abandoned. I think everyone who made and watched Tyr are responsible for Pylyp and for children like him.

The Day: The boy doesn’t look desperate.

T. T. : He is very kind, humane, but less so with each passing day. When I brought Pylyp to a sculptor friend of mine it was his first visit to a studio, he took a chunk of clay and made what turned out a stunning figurine. The sculptor, an Art Academy graduate, said their senior student could do nothing of the kind. In other words, the boy has an innate sense of artistry and plasticity. He is incredibly gifted and he and his like must be taken good care of.

The Day: On the other hand, homeless children are broadly discussed now. Didn’t you follow the trend, even if inadvertently?

T. T. : Yes, the subject is kicked about a good deal, but nothing is really done. I wanted to show a kid like this, children like him. I didn’t mean it as a final statement, saying there they are in the street. I wanted to raise the question of how they get to be so cruel and why. They are being treated unjustly, the adult generation has turned away from them, yet this older generation has neither a future nor past; it is also doomed. These small outcasts, their generation, will avenge this obduracy and lack of attention. A lot can be said on the subject, yet the cinema is the only way to paint an accurate striking picture. A man deceiving a child turns into that child’s target and must be meted out punishment, a bullet, by the laws of the movies.

The Day: Is it correct to describe your film as cruel?

T. T. : Not cruel. Tough would be more like it. My film is no more cruel than our life. I think that emotion is the main result of the art. The cinema spells emotions in the first place. The cinema should not give final answers, just food for thought. Now the problem of cruelty — our children’s mentality is a garbage heap, so there is only the screen, fragile glass separating them from homicide. Killing fellow human beings is not a problem, just press a button. Look at what they did in Yugoslavia. It was like a computer game, I mean the air raids. It’s not even considered a sin. It’s just that we must not mistake our daily realities for the time and space existing in movies. I met such shooting-gallery kids and talked to them. Indeed, there was a case when a couple of them high on glue went and shot at an old man running a shooting gallery. That’s how I got the idea. Life is even more cruel than we can fathom.

The Day: Do you feel any affinity for the so-called poetic cinema?

T. T. : The Ukrainian poetic cinema is a tale scribbled by critics, perfectly irrelevant and immaterial so far as filmmaking and art in general are concerned.. Every beautiful movie is poetic. I don’t know, it’s a tautology but poetry can be more or less poetic. The cinema has manipulated images from the outset, some producing better and deeper images, others not so successful; it all depends on one’s creative approach and vision. It’s no use arguing the subject and there’s no one to argue it with.

The Day: All right, could your film be described as social, by way of alternative?

T. T. : Absolutely not! What is a social film? It’s an even greater idiocy than the poetic cinema. I don’t know what you’re talking about. The cinema must be for people and about people. If a film is about a man, his pain, everybody will understand it. As for such categorizing, you better ask those that thought them up.

The Day: What did you learn from your teacher, Borys Savchenko?

T. T. : He never interfered in the creative process and always criticized the end product. Even in the first year at the institute he said that no one can teach anyone film-directing, so he won’t either. Kurosawa had his technique and Fellini his; neither was taught it. The main thing was their personal stand and vision. And so what Savchenko tried to do was cultivate in us our individual vision of the surrounding world, people, ethical rules, everything that which is most important in film-directing.

The Day: Of course, you’ve heard my next question a hundred times. Still, what are your impressions of Berlin?

T. T. : It’s a city suspended from hoisting cranes. No roots. There are lots of cranes, they lifted it and are holding it. Berlin is suspended in midair. It’s a mix of cultures, peoples, tastes, a cauldron; everything is on the go, moving forth and being modeled. A crazy city and I think one of the richest in the world; there are very many rich people who can afford to indulge their whims. Perhaps this is a great attainment of civilization. On the other hand, I had a feeling that the arts are degrading, lacking young blood. They are experimenting with forms, crossing a grass snake with a hedgehog, getting nowhere; no new sense is worked out. So it pays off to lure promising talented people from the former USSR into their prosperous environment.

The Day: What are you planning to do next?

T. T. : A diploma movie. I can’t comment on it, I have no right. We’ve been waiting for the institute subsidy for a year. Nothing. No one knows when we’ll get it. So we’ll have to work budget-free again. Nothing changes; you can get twenty most prestigious awards, nothing will happen in this country, no one will offer help.

The Day: But something is cooking in your kitchen; others spend years unable to make diploma pictures.

T. T. : I don’t know about others. If you are really set on a project, you will make it no matter what.