Maidan

The protests that began in Independence Square in Kyiv in November 2013 and what followed. The film records the process from the early mass meetings through the clashes to the funerals. It is not interested in heroes. It is interested in the crowd itself: the camera follows nobody, builds no character and conducts no interviews. The whole square is treated as a single subject, and the food distribution, the singing, the tents and the barricade are filmed with equal attention. The form is radically fixed: wide, long takes that barely move. There is no narrator, and the dates and events are indicated only by intertitles. Sound design comes forward, because most of the information arrives in the noise of the crowd. Sergei Loznitsa directed. It runs 130 minutes and was presented as a special screening at the Cannes Film Festival in 2014. Who it is for: viewers who like observational documentary, political history and formal rigour. Who it is not for: anyone who needs context. The film does not explain the background, and for a viewer who does not know the events there is nothing for two hours but a crowd.