Guest post by Nataliya Shpylova-Saeed.
This year the Ukrainian Homelands Series screens three films that explore memory from various perspectives. Akhtem Seitablayev’s Cyborgs: Heroes Never Die (2017) is one of the films that touches upon the current tragic and traumatic stage of contemporary Ukrainian history: a military conflict in the Donbass involving Ukraine and Russia. The annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation in 2014 was followed by the occupation of the eastern regions of Ukraine, which are known as the Donbass, an industrial area which is almost totally destroyed today. There are multiple attempts to turn this conflict into a stable narrative, a narrative which would help see how and why this tragedy developed and what it will lead to. In spite of the fact that the war has continued for more than five years, the narrative has not been formed.
One can enumerate a number of reasons for this instability — on the one hand, the conflict asks to consider various opinions; on the other hand, this conflict did not develop within a short period of time, it was not a mere continuation of the Crimea annexation. Within these five years, the Donbass has turned into a space that asks one to not only explore one’s identity, but also to re-evaluate one’s past, to re-visit one’s personal and national histories. The past becomes a territory that can potentially provide some answers to the question that seems to be asked too often: how did Ukraine and Russia end up in an armed conflict? This question is one of the topics that Seitablayev’s Cyborgs explores.
Cyborgs is a story about Ukrainian soldiers who participate in combat, fighting to regain control of Donetsk International Airport during the military conflict in the east of Ukraine. This storyline is based on true events — to regain control over Donetsk Airport was one of the strategic tasks for the Ukrainian Army fighting against the armed separatist groups sponsored and supported by the Russian Federation. The battles took place during May 2014 and January 2015. The airport was the last part of Donetsk held by the Ukrainian forces. In January 2015, the airport was taken by the separatist forces supported by Russia and affiliated with the so-called “Donetsk People’s Republic”; the Ukrainian forces were either killed, forced to retreat, or captured. Cyborgs documents this development to some extent. The story, however, goes far beyond a documentary recording: Seitablayev attempts to explore the nature of this war, whose participants once shared one country, either Ukraine, Russia, or the USSR.
The “cyborgs” represent different social and professional strata; they are also of different ages and even different political views. This is one of the war myths: all are united by one political view. As Cyborgs shows, political views may be different but there should be some way to communicate and speak with each other. The characters also speak different languages (Ukrainian, Russian, or both). They came to this war for their own reasons: some were drafted and others volunteered. There are those who became soldiers because of personal tragedies, such as losing their friends, relatives, and their children to the war. Cyborgs gradually develops one of the main questions: What is this war about? What is this fight for?
While depicting the war actions at Donetsk Airport, Cyborgs produces some space where political, ideological, and linguistic differences collide. There are a number of episodes that reveal how differently the Donbass war is perceived, understood, and narrated. For some, this is a war that symbolizes a failed attempt to unite Ukraine after the collapse of the Soviet Union; for others, this is a war that reveals the Ukrainians’ lack of interest in their own history and lack of appreciation of their own language and culture. The nationalist stance, however, is balanced by the fact that those who fight on the side of the Ukrainian Army speak Russian. This is not a war about language, as many tend to say. Ukraine is a multilingual country which is hard to imagine without a linguistic diversity; this does not eliminate, however, the fact that Ukrainian is the official language of the country.
One of the main characters is a middle-aged historian, Serpen’, who becomes a central force for the film’s narratives. It takes some knowledge of the past in order to be able to locate oneself in the multiplicity of (hi)stories. As the current events demonstrate, history can be easily manipulated through media and propaganda. How does one escape the manipulative power of propaganda which is rooted in half-truths and “alternative facts?” What the film emphasizes is one’s desire and ability to embrace one’s past and to move forward. The Donbass war reveals the power of memory–to a large extent, the war is nourished by the continuous manipulation of the past. The characters of the film discuss not only contemporary Ukraine, but the Soviet Union as well: the latter is viewed by those who fight against the Ukrainian Army as a prosperous country that was lost. The Soviet Union collapsed decades ago, but the memory of it—its romanticized and distorted version—still perseveres. The “cyborgs” may disagree with their opponents regarding the future of the country. For them, Ukraine is an independent political and geographical unit which cannot be violated. For their opponents, Ukraine is a failed country and they seek political and geographical affiliations which might be more prosperous for their own interests. Although divided politically, both Ukrainian soldiers and their opponents eventually recognize the ideological gap that contributes to the impossibility to reconcile.
Cyborgs constitutes part of the contemporary history of Ukraine which is marked with a deeply traumatic experience of war and destruction. The philosophical debates that the film includes aim to facilitate the understanding of the current military conflict. To understand the Donbass, however, one has to learn how to value one’s own history, as the historian Serpen’, who becomes a group leader, reminds us. In Cyborgs, history is a metaphor of one’s memory which can be easily manipulated through propaganda. This film is an introduction to the traumatic experiences caused and augmented by armed conflicts, exercising disastrous impacts on both national and international levels.
Cyborgs: Heroes Never Die will be shown at the IU Cinema on November 16 as part of the series Ukrainian Homelands.
Nataliya Shpylova-Saeed is a PhD student in the Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures. Her interests include memory studies, literature, and literary criticism.