Volcano / Vulkan

After a series of strange coincidences, an OSCE translator named Lukas finds himself in the southern Ukrainian city of Beryslav. There, he is hosted by a local man, Vova, and encounters an entirely different universe in which life seems completely detached from any usual order. Despite differing worldviews, Lukas gradually gets closer to Vova and his daughter Marushka, and he finds himself searching for long-lost happiness there.

Volcano marks the feature film debut of documentarian Roman Bondarchuk. Initially, Bondarchuk planned to create a documentary film about his homeland, with the central theme being the observation of local man Volodymyr’s life. However, over time, numerous stories of other people from the region became intertwined with this narrative. This led Bondarchuk to shift his vision and create a feature film where magical realism and absurdism share prominent space with documentary sketches. This transformation resulted in a deeply personal film, brimming with love for the native land and organically continuing the poetic traditions introduced by Dovzhenko in Ukrainian cinema.

The main role in the film is portrayed by non-professional actor Serhii Stepanskyi, a familiar face to the director and a well-known Ukrainian sound engineer. The film premiered at the International Film Festival in Karlovy Vary, Czechia, participating in the competition program “East of the West.” In Ukraine, it was first showcased at the Odesa Film Festival, and the director received the Taras Shevchenko National Award for his remarkable work.