ENG20 Days in Mariupol showed the city under the Russian siege. Here's the story behind the film

– Let's start with your Sundance award. As far as I understand, for you this is not so much about the recognition of your work, but rather about gaining access to a bigger platform to broadcast this story, right?

– Yes, it makes the film available to a larger audience. When a film is included in the festival circuit, its potential audience grows. It’s [important] for its further distribution through different channels, on streaming services, and in cinemas. The more recognition gained at festivals, the more cinemas will want to screen it all over the world, and the bigger the audience.

Sundance was a great springboard. We were surprised that the film received the audience award – we thought it would be too heavy. But it turned out people thought it was important.

– What feedback did you receive post-screenings? Perhaps you received people’s personal responses afterwards?

– It’s interesting to note that the organizers made sure there were counselors at every screening, specialists that people could talk to if they felt the need to.

– And did people do that?

– No, no one did. But some people approached me after the screenings and offered to give money to people in Mariupol. Or just asked how they could help.

– I know it’s a tentative question, but how will you assess the film’s impact?

– That’s what festivals are for. If the film wins an award at a festival, it means that the organizers and the audience understand the ideas and events it covered. Having people see and understand that is important. It’s difficult to reach people in this day and age. They exist in a vacuum, in their own media and information bubbles, in their own reality. It’s difficult to enter that bubble.

– I still have your footage of a Russian tank firing on a residential building before my eyes.

– I can’t explain that. I’d like to ask them. But I think that’s their tactic.

– To sow fear?

– I don’t think it’s about intimidating people. I don’t know what’s inside anyone’s head. But if you think about how [the Russians] captured Aleppo, Grozny or, later on, Popasna, they used the same tactic. Razing the city to the ground so that its defenders have nowhere to hide, then entering it. The scorched earth tactic, a medieval tactic for capturing cities. There’s no other explanation I can think of.

– I wanted to ask you about how you make decisions on what to include and what not to include. Because you’ve included a lot of things in this film…

– Some people even say too many.

– The circumstances pose an unprecedented challenge to all journalists, which was impossible to prepare for. I know this from my own experience: we faced a similarly challenging decision when [The Village Ukraine co-founder and publisher] Andrii Bashtovyi brought back his photographs from Bucha, some of the first images to capture Russian war crimes there. We spent a long time discussing where to draw the line in terms of what we can share with our readers. We eventually decided that we will share even the most violent photographs, so that as many people as possible get to see them. Every time I see Russian propaganda try to spin fake information – for example that the Bucha images were staged – I become increasingly convinced that we made the right decision.

– I imagine newsrooms all over the world had to grapple with similar decisions. And I think that the war has changed many publications’ policies regarding what they can and cannot publish. At least in part. And the reason this happened is that there were too many crimes and all of them had to be [documented]. And of course it was also related to the fact that the Russian propaganda has immediately responded to that.

It is also easier for me because I work for Associated Press, and AP publishes everything, they have no issues with this.

– You might have a bit more distance now, but do you have two separate identities you can tap into, something like Mstyslav the AP cameraman and Mstyslav the witness to these events?

– No. Being a journalist and bearing witness are the same for me.

Yes, my voice can be heard in the film, but I’m trying to keep a distance. I don’t want to impose my feelings on people. It was important for me not to make the voiceover overly emotional when we were recording it.

– Even though there are emotional elements [in the film] – for example when you talk about your family – they don’t clash with what you’re trying to show.

– There are some emotional elements in the film, but they are structurally separate.

– You mentioned the possibility of your footage being used in courts. Obviously, documenting war crimes is its own thing which has its own set of rules. But when you capture a Russian tank firing at a residential building, it’s not just about producing footage for the agency but also about the possibility of documenting a war crime.

– Back then it was as important as it is now. I don’t know if it will be used in courts, it’s not for me to decide. But the fact that this film exists as a document… The fact that this is not a news report, but a film, means that it has a longer shelf life.

This is one of journalism’s functions. Here is an example of the obvious need for journalists: the Mariupol Drama Theater was bombed the day after we escaped the siege and left the city. There were no journalists there. How to proceed? How to understand what happened, how many people were killed, what happened to those who were injured, and why it happened in the first place…

So it is absolutely critical that journalists are present at the sites where war crimes might take place, where human rights might be abused. Journalists absolutely have to be there, and journalists who are trusted internationally. Not just people with cameras or ordinary people, but professional journalists.

– One of the most powerful things you say in the film is this: “My brain wants to forget what I saw but the camera will remember.” Is that what you’re talking about here?

– We weren’t sure about this sentence, but in the end decided to keep it. It’s very personal. One of our main tasks was to limit the presence of the narrator so as not to distract people from the tragedies unfolding before the camera, the tragedies of Mariupol’s residents. The narrator’s function is solely to connect all of those stories, to guide the reader through the 90 minutes of the film, to fill the gaps and silences between the scenes.

– I keep returning to the part where Volodymyr, the policeman who accompanied you, tells you that he wants to address the world, on camera, after the maternity hospital attack. This is a moment that captures the power of journalism and documentary film-making.

– It’s curious that this scene was first released in Ukrainian. I didn’t have an opportunity to send both versions, so I ended up only sharing the Ukrainian. I had to decide what mattered the most. When we were editing the film we realized that we had to keep both the Ukrainian and the English versions.

– What do you think about the argument that showing all of the horrors Russia is committing in Ukraine will somehow influence the global response? On the one hand, this suggests the power of media. On the other hand, this year has shown that this is quite a naive viewpoint.

– All Ukrainian photographers and documentary filmmakers probably remember what Max Levin [a Ukrainian photographer and reporter killed in the war - ed.] used to say…

– That he dreamt of taking a photograph that would stop the war.

– I don’t think a photograph like that exists. But as a journalist and a documentary-maker, I can hope to take a photograph that might save someone’s life. Or just help someone. Doing this would be enough.

After we left Mariupol, we were told that the publication of our footage and photographs made it easier for officials to agree on “green corridors” [to evacuate civilians from Mariupol]. I hope that this saved someone’s life. That someone was able to find their relatives in a hospital, save them, get them out of Mariupol. I hope it helped some people. Even if it didn’t, I hope that it was significant from a historical point of view; this film will exist from now.

– Have you seen Mariupolis 2?

– I have. I’m very sad about what’s happened to Mantas [Kvedaravicius, the film’s director who was killed in Mariupol in April 2022 by the Russians - ed.]. It could’ve happened to us. He was tortured and shot. It’s horrible.

But it’s a good film. It’s totally different [from 20 Days in Mariupol], and it adds context which our film lacks.

– You focus on what’s happening in the city’s hottest spots, whereas Mariupolis 2 follows a community of people in one of the city’s residential neighborhoods.

– [Mariupolis 2] shows life [in Mariupol]. That’s what we lacked. And I’m glad that they were able to get that footage out of the city and show it to people.

– These two films allow us to piece together what it was like to be in Mariupol after 24 February.

– It’s astonishing that there is hardly any footage from the three months of Mariupol’s siege. I can’t believe that this is the case: a 21st-century city of 400,000 – and so little footage.

– There is this cliché that war brings out both the best and the worst in people; this is true of your film as well. In addition to showing how Russia is fighting this war, you are also showing the heroes of Mariupol – doctors, police officers, soldiers, and ordinary people – and the work that they’re doing. What are some of the best things you saw in people in those 20 days?

– The best was their ability to unite and help each other. People who didn’t know one another were saving each other’s lives. While risking their own. This wouldn’t have happened under normal circumstances, but this horror has united people, as well as brought out people’s real selves. Maybe in some sense this enormous tragedy has further united Ukrainians. Maybe in the future Mariupol’s tragedy will come to symbolize our national identity, and will become the symbol of our struggle and resistance. Not just struggle against the enemy, but struggle against fear.

– The scene in which a shopkeeper hands out food to the looters is just incredible.

– I was nearly beaten up five minutes before that scene took place. [Laughing] It’s not included in the film as I wasn’t filming, but I was running away from some people who wanted to take away my camera. [Laughing]

– [Your film] foregrounds the heroism of doctors who continued working even under those circumstances.

– I don’t want to single anyone out, but everyone who worked in that hospital were absolute heroes. The nurse who was shot by a sniper near the entrance… Fortunately, we were able to reconnect with everyone after [leaving Mariupol]. Everyone from that hospital is now working in Kyiv, all the doctors are there. [Mariupol intensive care hospital resumed its work in Kyiv in September 2022 - ed.]