Cambridge hosts ‘1% of War’ screening to mark third anniversary of full-scale invasion of Ukraine after ‘betrayal’ by US
The Ukrainian community in Cambridge marked the third anniversary of the full-scale invasion of their country with a screening of the new film 1% of War at Cambridge Tech Centre.
The title of the film refers to the 1 per cent of total footage shot that was used for the 28-minute final cut by the documentary maker Denys Khrystov.
Khrystov was a Ukrainian TV star making music videos when the Russians invaded and he adapted his skills to filming the epic odysseys portrayed in the film. The 28-minute documentary is 1 per cent of the total 3 terabytes of footage he shot during these heroic rescues.
The centre on Fitzroy Street filled up fast on Friday evening for the event which was organised by the Ukrainian HAM Centre. Stalls in the venue showcased Ukrainian culture, art, food, and charities. They included Nick Taylor of The Green Barn Barton, an outdoor clothing and equipment shop. Nick had a display of Ukrainian regimental badges on his stall.
“I run a shop sending military clothing to Ukraine,” he said. “It’s all the combat equipment - everything apart from the guns.” The Green Barn has despatched “thousands of uniforms” to the front line “and some have sent me back regimental badges - which they’ve been doing since 2014”.
Two stalls down is Vadym Granovskiy. Vadym is the creator of the ‘flat red’ a Ukrainian speciality coffee which mixes a double espresso with 110 ml of freshly squeezed orange and pomegranate juice, producing a 160ml drink.
“It’s a superfood,” he says as he offers me a shot with the fiery dark red liquid and, indeed, it is an intense and zingy beverage. The speciality flavour has proved hugely popular, with Vadym keeping 10k followers on X entertained as he represents Ukrainian culture and food at embassy and international events including Davos (three times).
Vadym has dual Ukrainian/UK citizenship, having initially arrived in 2001, was given indefinite leave to remain in 2011, and was awarded British citizenship last year. He studied at the London School of Coffee, "learning the academic way”. He currently resides in Sawbridgeworth, Essex.
The flat red emerged because he “needed colour”, having been approached by the car maker Lexus to create three new coffees at a launch event for three new models, one of which was red.
“I wanted to tickle someone’s brain,” he says of the brew. “The flat red is Ukraine’s gift to the world - it’s a unique gastronomic experience from Ukraine which I hope will go worldwide.”
Vadym was in the front row for this week’s Ukraine special BBC Question Time. So what does he say of this month’s incredible sea change in the world order, which has seen the new US administration shatter the post-war consensus by ceding crucial ground to the Kremlin?
“Ukraine has lost an ally - the US - both financially and militarily,” says Vadym, who adds: “The UK is my second home. Putin has threatened the UK as well. They want a cultural presence here, they have social media, they intoxicate people, you could see it on Question Time apart from Nick Carter mainly [General Sir Nicholas Carter served as Chief of the Defence Staff from June 2018 to November 2021].
“If Ukraine collapses they will digest the culture, the language, the population. They have done this with the Buryati [a Mongolian ethnic group native to Siberia conquered by Russia in the 17th century]. Now only 15 per cent of people speak Buryati, their own language, after centuries of being digested by Russia. They’re Siberians, but year by year they’ve been conditioned into believing they are Russians.
“The Russians don’t care about their death toll, but the future of warfare won't be about bodies, it will be about drones, technologies, AI.”
And the personal effect of the last ten days?
“Terrible,” replies Vadym. “It feels like a betrayal. To talk about peace without Ukraine being involved is terrible. [President] Trump doesn’t care about Ukraine, or the rest of the world, or even the UK.”
The room is full: people take their seats. The screening of 1% of War begins. The first segment shows Denys Khrystov driving a 4x4 through a bomb-shattered landscape. The devastation becomes endless, a journey to the heart of darkness. Denys seems to recognise a road on the way out of a town [Avdiivka in eastern Ukraine]. He parks up and walks down a track across open fields to some ruined farmhouses. It looks derelict but his rescue agency had received a request for evacuation, so he calls out, going further into the ruins.
Eventually someone comes out and Denys asks for the person he is here to evacuate. He’s there, but others are also stranded. The situation seems to be unravelling, Denys says they can all come but they have one minute to leave. He’s desperately hurrying these people up - people who have been living at the very furthest margins of what is humanly possible, for months, even years. But he’s right: the Russian drones have spotted their earlier movement, and the buildings are getting drone-bombed while they run back across the fields to the car and clamber in.
Just watching this one segment is exhausting: there’s complete silence in the auditorium. There’s no doubt, with maybe 80 per cent of the audience speaking to each other in Ukrainian, that each has experienced major consequences as a result of the invasion on 22 February, 2022 (not least the man from Mariupol who later asked a question).
In the next segment there’s some women involved in the evacuation and one of them is traumatised at seeing the apocalyptic ruination of her home city while she was stranded between Russian and Ukrainian front lines. ‘This is unbelievable,’ she screams. ‘What has happened here? On my god what is this? Where are all the people? What has happened here?’
Denys is trying to keep it all together. One time he stops with the rushed evacuation and says gently to the inhabitants: ‘What have you gone through here? It seems hardly possible that anyone can survive.’ Then, just as they are back in the 4x4, one of the women evacuees in the rear seat, who already has a dog on her lap, sees another dog wandering around.
‘Mushka!’ she calls out to the bewildered animal. ‘Come, Mushka!’ But is there room? There isn’t but Denys makes it happen anyway and we learn later the dog finds a new home in a happier part of the country: it’s the nearest we’re going to get to a happy ending in this war-ravaged setting.
Denys is at Cambridge Tech Centre with his cameraman and the film’s producer for the Q&A. The questions are mostly in Ukrainian and there’s a translator.
“This film is made for factual purposes to show what Ukrainians are going through right now,” Denys has said, and the translator adds: “He says he started filming because when the war started he realised he had to do something or the situation would negatively impact him psychologically.”
One member of the audience asks about the deeply unsettling situations in the film showing people who apparently chose not to be evacuated. Why had they opted to stay?
“The majority are elderly,” is the response, “who don’t want to be a burden on their children. People are also afraid to be labelled a refugee and the uncertain future that entails.”
Everyone at the centre expresses their gratitude for the way they have been treated since arriving in the UK.
Also at the screening is Inna Sukhoraba, who left Ukraine three days after the war started to stay with a cousin in Poland. Inna and her daughter were made aware of the Homes for Ukraine programme and came to the UK with her daughter. She now lives in Waterbeach and her daughter is studying at Norwich University.
“The people were amazing for me and my daughter,” Inna says. “All the British people have been so fantastic, I’ve been so grateful to them.”
Donations are invited to the Ukrainian HAM (Heritage, Art, and Music) Centre, a Cambridge-based organisation that hosts events and activities related to Ukrainian culture.
Details here.
