In the Fog

Sergei Loznitsa's second fiction feature is adapted from a story by Vasil Bykau and set in Nazi-occupied Belarus in 1942. It opens with three partisans hanged in a village square, an event Loznitsa keeps off camera. Sushenya, the railway worker who survives, is accused of betrayal, and two partisans come into the forest to shoot him. The film tracks three men, giving each a long flashback that functions almost as a self-contained short story. Loznitsa cuts as little as possible, works in extended takes and uses virtually no score. His question is simple and unanswerable: under occupation, is there any way to remain innocent? It played in competition at Cannes in 2012 and took the FIPRESCI Prize, and won the Golden Apricot at Yerevan the same year. Who it is for: viewers who value slow, quiet war cinema that makes no moral concessions. Who it is not for: anyone after combat, pace or heroism, all of which the film refuses on purpose.