Bordering Poland and Slovakia, Stuzhytsya is a remote, sleepy village situated near the Carpathian mountains in Ukraine; it literally means “cold place”. Within the already tiny local population, there exists a gender imbalance: most of the men have left for better job opportunities in the EU and elsewhere. Centring on the women who have stayed behind, Maksym Melnyk’s documentary is an intimate exploration of the hopes, dreams and loneliness that swell in a place seemingly forgotten by the outside world.
Initially observational in style, the film introduces us to a charismatic trio of women. Nelya, a biologist, sweetly lights up whenever she comes across a pile of animal excrement, rich with valuable samples for her sadly underfunded research into the ecosystem of insects. The lack of government support also plagues Maria, Stuzhytsya’s only postal worker. In charge of distributing meagre pensions to the villagers, she is constantly anxious about the lack of stamps provided by the state. Such a shortage would mean a delay in welfare support, which would be catastrophic for the residents.
The third of the trio is Hanna; she is more advanced in age than her neighbours and is a farmer who proclaims herself to be the saddest woman in the world. Over the course of their blossoming rapport, Hanna lovingly prepares meals for Melnyk and his crew, and, in return, they shower her with gifts for her birthday and Christmas. Completed in 2019, before the Russian invasion, the film carries a certain political resonance regarding current affairs, but at the same time there’s a rewarding sense of timelessness about Three Women. It proposes a different relationship between film-makers and subjects – one that makes space not only for information exchange, but also for emotional connection.
• Three Women is on True Story from 5 April.
