On February 24th in the morning my boyfriend and I decided to go from Kyiv to Irpin to see his parents. It is hard for me to recall the chronology of those days, my mind blocks and minimizes all the memories, erases them, but the only thing I know for sure is that every day everything rapidly became worse.

The film is included in the anthology of short films Ukrainian New Wave. We Are (2025).

The documentary Malanka and Christmas captures the celebration of Malanka just a month before the full-scale Russian invasion and the first Christmas in the newly de-occupied territories of Ukraine’s Slobozhanshchyna and Donechchyna. 

Dmytro Mazuriak is a Ukrainian musician and sopilka player with the band Kazka, who devoted 15 years to preserving the Malanka tradition in his home village of Ispas, Bukovyna. A craftsman of traditional Hutsul instruments, Dmytro returns from Kyiv every year to organise the Malanka festival in his community. Just a month after his last 2022 festival, a full-scale invasion began. By the end of 2022, Ukrainian forces had liberated much of Slobozhanshchyna and Donechchyna, though relentless shelling made life in these areas a daily struggle, especially in winter. To show solidarity and revive ancient Ukrainian traditions in these de-occupied areas, young people from across Ukraine came together to perform nativity scenes and bring hope to the east.