Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Ukrainian intelligence services have intercepted thousands of phone calls that Russian soldiers made from the battlefield to their families and friends in Russia. Oksana Karpovych’s award-winning documentary Intercepted juxtaposes extracts from selected phone calls with images of destruction and day-to-day life in Ukraine, painting a stark picture of the cruelty of war and mundane resistance. Interacting with these images, the voices of Russian soldiers reveal a spectrum from heroic illusions to disappointment and loss of reason, from looting to vicious war crimes, from propaganda to doubt and disillusionment. Refraining from voice-over or commentary, Intercepted urges the viewer to observe and listen to the dehumanizing power of war and the imperialist nature of the Russian invasion.
Followed by a moderated discussion with:
- Oksana Karpovych, film director
- Nataliya Tchermalykh, Senior Lecturer, University of Geneva
- Till Mostowlansky, Research Professor in Anthropology and Sociology at the Geneva Graduate Institute
