The Editorial Office Review: Truth Gone Up in Flames

The Editorial Office drops us into the hot Ukrainian steppe, where young naturalist Yura is on a quixotic quest to save his local forest by snapping pics of a rare groundhog. But director Roman Bondarchuk quickly subverts the charming premise, confronting Yura with the grim realities of a society in decay. Having cut his teeth on hard-hitting docs, Bondarchuk knows this territory all too well, and that insight imbues the film with an urgent authenticity.

Shot in the months just before Russia’s brutal 2022 invasion, The Editorial Office now stands as a startling preview of the turmoil to come. Yet rather than political polemics, Bondarchuk weaves absurdist humor and visual poetry, crafting a complex tapestry that’s both deeply rooted in Ukraine and universal in its insight into human foibles.

Led by journalist-turned-actor Dmytro Bahnenko, the film escorts us through an increasingly hallucinatory funhouse mirror, reflecting back uncomfortable truths about greed’s corrosion of truth. But Bondarchuk’s images possess a lyrical beauty belying the ugliness within, beckoning us to keep watching even as the ground crumbles beneath our feet.

Truth Gone Up in Flames

When we first meet Yura, he seems an unlikely hero – a lowly museum worker using his camera to track down a rare groundhog, not for fame but in hopes of protecting its habitat. Yet witnessing an unsettling act of arson in those same woods soon transforms the shy ecologist into a crusading reporter. After snapping pics of the firestarters in uniform, the gutsy Yura tries alerting the authorities. But in this southern Ukrainian backwater of 2021, truth has gone up in flames along with the trees.

Rebuffed at every turn, our plucky underdog soon falls down the rabbit hole of local corruption. First stop is a newspaper where fabrication is the only currency. Assigned “fluff pieces”, the principled Yura tries exposing the arson instead, only to be buried by his editor. Before long, he’s entangled with Machiavellian politicians and their wealthy patrons, who keep power through shows of lethal force and viral fakery.

As the clashes intensify, clearer visions emerge from the smoke – of systemic decay, strange cults even stranger bedfellows. When Yura’s colleague Mykhailo mysteriously vanishes, our hero presses on, joined in his quest by bold co-worker Lera. But justice remains elusive as unseen forces puppeteer the community. In this carnival funhouse, truth bends to wealth and bullets speak louder than words. By the surreal climax, the hostile takeover is complete, leaving Yura to sift for meaning amidst the ashes of a society in freefall.

Sisyphus in the Sand

On the surface, the frequent glimpses of frolicking groundhogs suggest a lighthearted nature documentary. But in The Editorial Office, these squeaky critters carry the weight of the world. Director Bondarchuk wields the humble marmot as metaphors for life’s endless cycles amidst decay. Our Groundhog Day is the endless corruption that smothers truth and meaning.

As the habitat of their country collapses, Yura and his loved ones burrow deeper into delusions – cults, crypto schemes, viral stunts. Laughter in the dark veils the tears as Bondarchuk ruthlessly satirizes the absurdity that normalizes society’s downfall. Every outlandish vignette reflects an unflinching gaze at moral compromise. EachGroundhog glimpsed hints at goals forever out of reach, the futility of believing one small truth can overcome such deep-rooted rot.

So Yura persists in pushing that rock up the hill, chasing the scoop that may never come. And we root for him, for his dogged faithrecalls our own yearning for accountability and justice. Yet Bondarchuk refuses easy heroes, confronting imperfect motives all around. In depicting this pre-war collapse, he indicts every level of complicity while retaining deep-rooted compassion for the humans caught in the machine.

Absurdism mingles with dream logic until hope itself seems a cruel joke. All that remains is the choice between laughing or crying at the eternal recurrence of lies over truth, power over people. The groundhog grins because he’s seen this movie before.

Beauty Emerging from the Ashes

Cinematographer Serhiy Mykhalchuk lenses the Ukrainian steppe with a magic hour glow, bathing scenes of both breathtaking beauty and banal ugliness in summer haze. Saturated sunsetsИ silhouetted figures evoke the paintings of Hopper, hinting at the profound alienation within this landscape of longing. Mykhalchuk’s roving camera hints at unseen forces swirling, his deep focus and symmetrical frames subtly imposing order on the surrounding chaos.

Guiding this waltz between beauty and decay, director Bondarchuk orchestrates a tonal high-wire act. Moments of otherworldly whimsy alchemize into pitiless violence then snap back into satire, echoing radical tonal shifts of Kaurismäki and surrealists like Radu Jude. Yet Bondarchuk’s touch remains remarkably steady even as situations spiral out of control, his absurdist sensibilities aligned with the Coen Brothers. Macabre humor bubbles up unexpectedly – until a dedication to the late editor solemnly grounds us in stark reality.

Casting spoken-word poet Dmytro Bahnenko proves a masterstroke, his haunted eyes and hangdog expression telegraphing bone-deep disillusion. As supporting players wink at the camera, his performance anchors the slipstream, radiating torment even as deadpan antics unfold around him. Months later during production, many faces here would be fighting real wars. But Bondarchuk bottles the last glimmers of an fading era, beauty frozen in time before the deluge.

Harbingers on the Horizon

Hovering over every frame of The Editorial Office is the phantom menace of invasion soon to come. Yet Bondarchuk’s gaze remains firmly fixed on the homefront weakness and complacency allowing that hostile force its foothold. His indictment spares no faction even as it brims with compassion for the humanity buried beneath.

As authority figures chase vapid stunts over substantive change, the film reveals propaganda and foreign meddling already tearing at the social fabric. But blame rests squarely on the shoulders of those letting fear and greed drive them into the arms of tyrants. Amidst the amped-up absurdity, very real dangers loom – of truth distorted, accountability erased, entire swathes of society reduced to puppets with the powerful hiding behind curtains, beyond reach.

The credibility gap grows from newsrooms pumping fiction to social channels weaponizing lies, enables the seizure of land and meaning. Without facts, justice falls prey to showmanship and threats, any election a bad joke. In depicting these prescient threats, The Editorial Office stands as a dire warning to Ukraine and the world over. Power derives from the consent of the informed public; lose that foundation and the house soon follows.

Yet for all the high stakes, Bondarchuk’s touch remains endearingly humane. Sardonic without sadism, he highlights frailties universal to both sides of the battlefield. His tragi-comic lens examines the overtime corrosion of dignity for citizens just trying to get by, his judicious editing adding layers to caricatures. In the crowd scenes, individual faces shine bright with quiet resilience and weary optimism now devastated by events off-screen. By capturing this pivotal moment with utter sobriety, The Editorial Office makes a commanding case for cinema’s power to awaken, warn and remember.

Gallows Humor from the Brink of Disaster

The Editorial Office makes no apologies for the bewildering breadth of its ambitions. Layering cringe comedy, magic realism, geopolitical thriller and dystopian nightmare, Bondarchuk deliberately overwhelms, placing us in the shoes of those desperately clinging to reason amidst rising chaos.

The sheer density of detail and incident might test some viewers’ patience; few wander this unmapped terrain without losing the thread now and then. Uneven pacing and continuity gaps hint at edits made in haste during wartime turmoil. But imperfections aside, The Editorial Office remarkably holds its shape as both intimate personal story and sweeping societal autopsy.

Straddling documentary and delirium, Bondarchuk bore witness to the unmaking of the world he knew, one norm erosion at a time. With gallows humor and hallucinatory imagery, he transforms helplessness into protest, reality into something stranger and more true. The result stands as a bold, consistently arresting statement on the universal struggle for truth and moral clarity in rapidly darkening times. Bleak yet transcendently beautiful, The Editorial Office heralds a major directorial talent while issuing an urgent wakeup call we dismiss at our own peril.

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