On Saturday, March 12, the Martha’s Vineyard Film Center will host a special screening of “The Earth Is Blue as an Orange,” starting at 7:30 pm.
The film, directed by Ukrainian filmmaker and writer Iryna Tsilyk, follows single mother Anna and her four children as they document their lives under siege in Ukraine.
Eldest daughter Mira dreams of becoming a cinematographer. As bombs descend on neighboring homes, the family construct, act in, and edit stylized scenes of dangerous predicaments they’ve lived to tell. Mira’s recreations ratchet up the drama, using local soldiers, tanks, and even her own grandmother to tell terrifying tales of survival. Meanwhile, Iryna quietly captures their more quotidian moments during their shoots and in between takes — scenes that include Mira’s siblings squabbling over line readings, cozy dinners by the fire, and Anna’s compassionate gaze as she watches Mira apply to film school.
Eventually, the two projects fuse into a single vision that gorgeously encapsulates the extremes of war, both its explosive trauma and its mundane peripheral existence in everyday life. With great insight, “The Earth Is Blue as an Orange” observes how a family and a filmmaker cope with war using their cameras, working in tandem to create meaning out of a meaningless conflict.
According to founder and executive director of the Film Society Richard Paradise, he found the documentary just a week or two ago, while he was researching more about Ukraine and what led up to the war that is currently raging. “We’ve all been watching, listening, and reading about the war going on in Ukraine,” Paradise said. “I wanted to know more about when this really began, when pro-Russian separatists clashed with Crimea and the Donbas region of Ukraine.”
Paradise said he appreciates the film because it isn’t structured and shot in a conventional documentary style, but instead, the director and Anna use cinema to create a more tellable story of the tragedies the people of Ukraine have had to endure. “This isn’t just a straightaway documentary of talking heads — this is a human story that documents the plight and survival story of this mother and her children,” Paradise explained.
Although Paradise could have made a monetary donation to one or all of the several charities the film proceeds will benefit, he said hosting a fundraiser screening provides a platform for folks to be educated, galvanized to action, and encouraged to join the cause. “This seems like a no-brainer to try and help the humanitarian efforts in Ukraine, a country and its citizens that are suffering so greatly under this unprovoked war,” Paradise said. He added that the Film Society fundraiser screening will feature a guest speaker preview — an American businessman who runs a company in Ukraine and has been working to get his employees to safety and provide support.
Admission is $15, and all proceeds from the screening will be donated to humanitarian agencies working in Ukraine and neighboring countries that are helping refugees. If you can’t attend the showing but would like to support the effort, visit the World Central Kitchen at bit.ly/WCK_MVFS, the Ukraine Red Cross at bit.ly/Red_Cross_Ukraine, or Save the Children at bit.ly/Save_The_Children_Ukraine. Doors open for admissions 30 minutes prior to the screening. Buy tickets at the Film Center or online at bit.ly/Tickets_MVFS.