22, director
NikopolKyiv
“The Living and The Dead” project was created as a reflection on one accident: I once received a call from my godmother who asked me to take her father’s ashes and send them to his hometown by post. Despite the absurd situation, at that moment, I remained emotionless and absolutely indifferent to the story of the deceased as well as to such life experience in general.
Later on, I learned about the details of this man’s death and started thinking about the nature of (lack of) care and how it grows and is manifested in society today when tragedy and death surround us daily. Sometimes we don’t have space for compassion and we are not ready to share someone’s pain in addition to our own concerns. Therefore, the displays of empathy become the greatest virtues.
I want to study the nature of care in this project, which will be the basis for a future short film. When we abandon the common view of the world, it leads us not only to the discomfort of unknown situations but also to the brighter, deeper, and real experience of living the moment. Once we drop thoughts about the familiar personal reality and open up to the unknown world of another person, we can experience something new or feel life as an act rather than as something granted to us.
These ideas are represented as a comparison of two parallel scenarios. In the first one, the main character is me, an author, who describes the scenes of a real story, in the other scenario, the main character is a fictional hero, Rostik, who decides to find out whose ashes he holds in his hands and what kind of person was the deceased man.
That’s how we see two different experiences — THE LIVING AND THE DEAD.
CALL FROM A GODMOTHER
(Yehor/Rostik)
A call from a godmother from Norway. She asks to take her father’s ashes and send them home by Nova Post service. Yehor/Rostik agrees.
[“I didn’t know her father had died…”]
A CONVERSATION
(Yehor/Rostik)
Yehor/Rostik tries to find a funeral home in the cemetery. Yehor/Rostik makes a call. An insolent, insensitive voice is asking whose ashes the boy is after. The piece of paper in the hand says: “STEPAN HOLOVAKIN, DATE OF BIRTH: 21.06.1963”. After Yehor/Rostik dictates this information over the phone, the voice answers:
VOICE: I don’t care about the date of birth. Tell me the date of death.
YEHOR/ROSTIK: I don’t know.
IN A FUNERAL HOME
(Yehor/Rostik)
The text on the collage: “PRIESTESS”, “DEATH”
Coffins and urns are around in a funeral home. A woman with dyed hair and heavy make-up (“She’s obviously boasting that she’s alive”) sits at a table. She writes something down in a notebook with a pen, then rummages behind a big cupboard. Taking an urn:
THE WOMAN: This is your Mr. Holovakin.
YEHOR/ROSTIK: But it says “Liudmyla” here…
THE WOMAN(looking at the urn): Ah, yeah.
IN A TAXI
(Yehor/Rostik)
As Yehor/Rostik gets into a taxi, a young driver turns down the radio with Bayraktar songs“Bayraktar songs” are Ukrainian military and patriotic songs that gained popularity following the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. The name references the song "Bayraktar" by Ukrainian singer Taras Borovok, which is dedicated to the Turkish attack drones used by the Ukrainian Armed Forces.. While driving, he often looks at the urn through the rearview mirror with some embarrassment or guilt. He is keeping silent. Only when he drops me, the driver says, lowering his gaze:
A TAXI DRIVER(whispering): I’m sorry that…
YEHOR/ROSTIK (with some embarrassment or guilt): Thank you.
AT THE POST OFFICE
(Yehor/Rostik)
A lady at the desk pays no attention to people and is concentrated on typing something in the terminal.
A LADY: Send or receive?
YEHOR/ROSTIK: Send.
A LADY: Declared value?
YEHOR/ROSTIK: (SILENT)
[“How to estimate the value of a person??”]
YEHOR/ROSTIK: One thousand hryvnias.
A LADY (typing in terminal): What do you send?
YEHOR/ROSTIK: The ashes.
A lady stops typing and turns her eyes to a boy. She has big eyes and a cross on her neck.
A LADY: We don’t deliver such things.
PARCEL LOCKER #1
(Yehor)
Yehor is near a parcel locker in the neighboring building. He puts the urn with Mr. Holovakin’s ashes in a locker and describes the parcel as “the pottery products” in online shipment form.
The urn is made of dark granite.
WHO’S IN THE URN?
(Rostik)
The text on the collage: «IN MEMORY OF A COMRADE», «WHEN ONE MUST LIVE»
Rostik sits near the post office holding Mr. Holovakin’s urn and ignoring the looks of passers-by. He talks with the godmother. Rostik finds out the following:
Mr. Holovakin’s ashes have been kept in the funeral home for three months.
Mr. Holovakin was from Chortomlyk (his ashes should be sent there) and worked in Kyiv at the construction site.
Mr. Holovakin’s son lives in Kyiv. Rostik could give the ashes to him. [“Why didn’t the son take the ashes?”]
Godmother doesn’t reply to the question about how Mr. Holovakin died.
THE SON, OR A LUNCH BREAK
(Rostik)
The text on the collage: «MEMORY ABOUT FATHER»
A barista — name is Jan — is at the summer terrace. He studies the documents that Rostik received with the urn and eats rice from a lunch box.
JAN: I am really sorry that you had to do that. But I honestly don’t want to have anything to do with this man. He didn’t want to either.
ROSTIK (after a while): I cannot carry him around all the time.
Jan hands one of the documents to Rostik.
JAN: It should be sent to his work.
Rostik doesn’t respond. He takes a document.
ICE CREAM AND OLD AGE
(Rostik)
The urn with Mr. Holovakin’s ashes is in the shop’s locker. An old lady curiously examines the locker. Rostik returns with an ice cream in hand and takes out the urn.
AN OLD LADY: What is this urn?.. (making the sign of the cross) Rest in peace.
ROSTIK: I don’t know… The urn.
AN OLD LADY: Nice urn. Where did you take it?
ROSTIK: I don’t know… It was given to me.
AN OLD LADY: Can I take a picture of it? I’ll show it to my daughter so that she can order the same.
MEETING WITH A SITE MANAGER
(Rostik)
The text on the collage: «SHORT COURSE ON PAPER ARCHITECTURE»
The construction site manager, an older man with a tanned face, reads a document occasionally looking at Rostik.
SITE MANAGER: This is bullshit… What the fuck do I need it for?
ROSTIK: I don’t know, I was told that you…
SITE MANAGER: “I don’t know, I don’t know”, your old man didn’t know a damn thing too…
The man makes the sign of the cross without any emotions.
SITE MANAGER: Rest in peace… (to Rostik) His junk is still in the trailer if no one has stolen it yet. Will you take it?
IN A TRAILER
(Rostik)
The text on the collage:
«CROSSWORD PUZZLE»,
«A SOCIOLOGICAL PORTRAIT: UKRAINIANS THROUGH THE EYES OF UKRAINIANS»,
«HERZEN’S FAMOUS “LETTERS TO THE FUTURE” SAID THE FOLLOWING: WE CAN UNDERSTAND THE PRINCIPAL TONE OF IT (AUTHOR’S NOTE: FUTURE) NOW. IT WILL BELONG TO SOCIAL IDEAS. SOCIALISM WILL REACH ALL THE PHASES UP TO ITS EXTREME CONSEQUENCES, UP TO NONSENSE»,
«CAN YOU TELL THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A GERMAN AND A SWEDE IF THEY DON’T SAY A WORD? AND BETWEEN A RUSSIAN AND A UKRAINIAN, A BELARUSIAN AND A POLE?... CERTAIN STEREOTYPES ABOUT A NATIONAL PHENOTYPE, IN THIS CASE UKRAINIAN PHENOTYPE, REALLY EXIST. WHAT DOES A TYPICAL UKRAINIAN LOOK LIKE?»,
«DEMOCRACY CAN CREATE NOTHING, IT’S NOT ITS BUSINESS, IT WILL BECOME NONSENSE AFTER THE DEATH OF THE LAST ENEMY. THE DEMOCRATS KNOW ONLY (AS CROMWELL SAID) WHAT THEY DON’T WANT, BUT THEY DON’T KNOW WHAT THEY WANT.»
Rostik sits in a construction trailer bending over the pile of Ogoniok magazines“Ogoniok” (literally, ‘light’) is a Soviet and Russian weekly illustrated socio-political, literary, and artistic magazine published from 1899 to 2020. and time to time flipping through them. Behind him, a man in a working uniform, Holovakin’s neighbor Volodymyr leaned on a table, wobbling.
VOLODYMYR: He was a bit weird… He took this shit from that facility that we were dismantling… He found it in a basement and took it with him. There were more, but we…
Volodymyr stops in the half of a sentence. Rostik holds a magazine with a finished crossword puzzle and words underlined with a red pencil.
VOLODYMYR (scratching his neck): We need to honor him…
DEATH OF MR. HOLOVAKIN (FLASHBACK)
(Rostik)
The text on the collage:
«I FEEL SICK TODAY, I’LL SKIP WORK», «OK»,
«MY HEART!!!», «TAP… TAP… BEEP… BEEP…»,
«BAM!»
While Volodymyr is standing in the queue to buy alcohol, he tells Rostik the story of Mr. Holovakin’s death. Shocked, Rostik doesn’t know what to say. Volodymyr draws his attention:
VOLODYMYR: Take out your wallet, we’re next.
A WAKE
(Rostik)
Rostik and men in working uniforms and with weathered faces sit at a table. Volodymyr pours vodka into glasses.
VOLODYMYR: Oh, son… He told me that you are strange… But you do a good thing, the father needs to be honored.
Everyone takes their glasses, Rostik as well. He wants to say that Mr. Holovakin was not his father but for some reason, he keeps silent. They raise the glasses.
VOLODYMYR: Well… For Lionia, rest in peace.
[“His name was Stepan”]
PARCEL LOCKER #2
(Rostik)
Rostik puts a bag with Ogoniok magazines on the floor and places the urn with Mr. Holovakin’s ashes inside the parcel locker cell. He thinks about what to write in the “declared value” box in an online shipment form for a while, and even longer he thinks about how to answer the question “What do you send?”. He fills out the form and closes the cell.
Rostik takes a bag and goes away, fighting the feeling that he is the only person who cares about Mr. Holovakin.
Text, collages: Yehor Harmash
Translation: Dariia Titarova