My Films Catalogue of Films

To Die to Live

Special Screenings / To Die to Live / Ukraine, Latvia, Slovak Republic 2026

Screenings

Monday 6/7 / 13:00

Karlovy Vary Theatre

4D2

Tuesday 7/7 / 12:00

Small Hall

522

Thursday 9/7 / 17:00

Cinema B

756

Saturday 11/7 / 09:00

Drahomira Cinema

9K1

Synopsis

In 2014, Shakhta, Dancer, and Potter volunteered for the army in order to fight in the Russo-Ukrainian conflict in eastern Ukraine. Although the horrible things they experienced during two years on the front accompany them for every second of their existence, they try to return to civilian life. But the Russian invasion in 2022 forces them to again confront the war. Filmed over the course of twelve years, this documentary uses a fragmentary cinematic language to evoke the trauma experienced by its protagonists, and thus to help us imagine the unimaginable: how to accept that some live while others die, and that – faced with one’s own death – what remains above all is the desire to live.

Natalia Kozáková

About the film

122 min / Color, DCP
World premiere
Director Yuliia Hontaruk / Screenplay Yuliia Hontaruk / Dir. of Photography Denys Strashnyi Yurii Gruzinov Yuliia Hontaruk / Music Anton Baibakov, Miroslav Tóth, Anton Dehtiarov / Sound Mariia Nesterenko, Andrii Rohachov, Andrii Nidzelskyi, Patrik Pál, Dávid Jonás / Editor Roman Liubyi ,Uģis Olte, Mykola Bazarkin, Yuliia Hontaruk, Iryna Stetsenko, Pavlo Zelenov, Petro Tsymbal / Producer Yuliia Hontaruk, Ivanna Khitsinska, Alexandra Bratyshchenko, Uldis Cekulis, Katarina Krnacova, Ihor Savychenko / Production Babylon 13 Production / Cast Sergii Kutrakov, Oleksii Oleksiuk, Andrii Patorzhynskyi / Contact Babylon 13, NOISE Film & TV

About the director

Yuliia Hontaruk. Filmography: Alcoholic (Alkoholichka, 2013, short), Stronger Than Arms (Sylnishe nizh zbroya, 2014, doc., co-dir.), Euromaidan. Rough Cut (Yevromaidan. Chornovyi montazh, 2014, doc., co-dir.), Ten Seconds (Desyat sekund, 2016, doc.), To Die To Live (2026, doc.).