The Russian Woodpecker (2015)
- General info
- Available formats
- Synopsis:
- The films focuses on Fedor Alexandrovich's research into the cause of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Ukraine and its potential connection to a Soviet Cold War-era structure, the Duga over-the-horizon radio antenna. His investigation is interrupted and impacted by the 2014 Euromaidan uprising, which eventually led to the ousting of the president Viktor Yanukovych.
- Actors:
- Andrei Alexandrovich, Fedor Alexandrovich, Igor Alexandrovich, Natalia Barabovskaya, Andrei Bilyk, Fedor Chebanenko, Charlie D'Agata, Anatoly Duatlov, Fedor Dubrovka, Boris Gorbachev, Mikhail Gorbachev, Viktor Janoekovytsj, Vitali Klytsjko, Vladimir Komarov, Georgy Kopchinski, Svetlana Korotkova, Nikolai Kravchuk, Andrew Michtrowski, Vladimir Musiets, Alexander Naumov
- Directors:
- Chad Gracia
- Genres:
- Documentary, Special Interest
- Awards:
2015 Sundance Film Festival World Cinema Jury Prize Documentary
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Reviews (1) of The Russian Woodpecker
At best confused, at worst insane - The Russian Woodpecker review by RL
Some of the camera work, the shots of Pripyat and Duga are great. The line up of interviewees is good and it does show the power that the Soviet Union still has over those who worked for it.
However the central premise of the documentary is at best confused and at worst insane. Fedor is portrayed as some sort of quasi-prophet character, despite the fact he looks drunk or wired half the time. The strange, although thankfully rare, interspersion of his "artistic" work is out of place. He doesn't really seem to get any evidence of Chernobyl being a Duga cover up, he just makes old Soviets look shifty. I've done a lot of reading and visited the site and my two guides were very anti-Soviet and they don't think it was on purpose, let alone making a weird link to Duga.
What we have here are a group of young men unhappy with the way Russia is trying to take over Ukraine. I've always been pro-Ukraine, especially since I visited there. But I fear this documentary makes Fedor and those of his ilk look mad, ill informed and a little dangerous. Using the Chernobyl disaster to promote anti-Russian feeling is not a new concept but it shouldn't be done so sloppily by someone who should know better.