Songs of Slow Burning Earth

Dir. Olha Zhurba. 2024, 95 mins. Ukraine/France/Sweden/Denmark. DCP. In Ukrainian and Russian with English subtitles. Filmed over two years in Ukraine, Zhurba’s epic depiction of her society under siege by Russia moves ineluctably from one grandly scaled, finely detailed scene of calamity to another, each designated by its degree of proximity to the front. From Kyiv’s central train station (31 KM), captured amid the confusion of the invasion’s initial days, to a state school in Ternopil (906 KM), where children are instructed to dream a better future, to the ruins of the village of Pravdyne in the Kherson (28 KM), where ashen-faced men exhume common graves, Songs of Slow Burning Earth begins as a somber survey of the wreckage of war before becoming a fortifying record of communal resilience. East Coast premiere  

Tickets: $17.50 / $12 senior and students / $10 youth (ages 3–17) / free for MoMI members at the Senior/Student level and above. There is a $1.50 transaction fee per ticket for all online purchases. The cost of admission may be applied toward a same-day purchase of a membership. 

Order tickets. Please pick up tickets at the Museum’s admissions desk upon arrival. All seating is general admission. 

About the filmmaker:

Olha Zhurba is a Ukrainian film director, editor, and screenwriter. Her short fiction film Dad’s Sneakers (2021) premiered at the Locarno FF and later won awards at many international festivals. Dad’s Sneakers was a candidate for a nomination at the European Film Awards 2022. Outside (2022) is her debut documentary, which premiered at CPH:DOX and HOT DOCS and won the Willy Brandt award at the Human Rights Film Festival Berlin and later the Japan Prize Award of Honor. She was also the editor of the festival hits and award-winning documentary films This Rain Will Never Stop (2021) and Home Games (2018).