Film Review: Slovo House Unfinished Novel (Budynok Slovo. Neskinchenyi Roman)
by Erin Huebscher
SLOVO HOUSE UNFINISHED NOVEL (BUDYNOK SLOVO. NESKINCHENYI ROMAN)
Taras Tomenko, Ukraine 2022
Set against the backdrop of the Holodomor, one of the largest genocides of the 20th century that caused the deaths of nearly seven million people, this haunting Ukrainian film shows just how persecution can unfold in a totalitarian regime.
Kharkiv, once the capital of Soviet Ukraine in the 1930s, was then home to a generation of Ukrainian artists who are housed together in a luxury apartment building and tasked with creating a unified Soviet voice – no matter the cost. When an ambitious yet talentless poet Vladimir Akimov arrives, the whole artistic community is slowly turned upside down and sinister events begin to unfold. Keeping Russia’s invasion of Ukraine top of mind, SLOVO HOUSE UNFINISHED NOVEL examines Ukraine’s complex past, and lets the audience ruminate over its future.
