Grey Bees

Grey Bees takes place in January just before Russia’s full-scale attack on Ukraine. Serhiich and Pashka are neighbors in “The Grey Zone” of Donbas which most people have left. The two visit each other constantly, often arguing, but at the same time silently understanding each other. When a dead body is found and voices of unknown cars are heard in the night, the war becomes apparent and neighbors have to come to terms with what neutrality or “grayness” means in the new situation. This slow-paced film reaches almost the intimacy of a play as it depicts the tense, sometimes absurd situation after the occupation of Crimea and just before the war. Based on a novel by Andrii Kurkov, Grey Bees is an essential part of the thematic series of modern Ukrainian cinema that depicts the psychology of a conflict that developed into a war in 2022.

Valtteri Lepistö