Films on Russian aggression in Ukraine (Crimea) (2014-present)
Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2014, annexing the Crimea and later partly occupying the east of Ukraine, tearing apart the largest independent European state. Millions of Ukrainians were displaced and thousands of mothers in almost each town in Ukraine have to bury their children who fell as soldiers protecting their homeland in this announced war; hundreds of Ukrainians became Kremlin's political prisoners.
In February 2022 Russia invaded Ukraine again, with the war and the occupation ongoing. Over 10M Ukrainians were forced to leave their homes, over 3M became refugees abroad, several localities completely destroyed. Around 150 children killed.
These events are being reflected in both documentaries and fictions, as yet another geopolitical crucifixion of Ukraine by Russia.
(There are more topical films, the list profiles IMDb entries.)
In February 2022 Russia invaded Ukraine again, with the war and the occupation ongoing. Over 10M Ukrainians were forced to leave their homes, over 3M became refugees abroad, several localities completely destroyed. Around 150 children killed.
These events are being reflected in both documentaries and fictions, as yet another geopolitical crucifixion of Ukraine by Russia.
(There are more topical films, the list profiles IMDb entries.)
List activity
7.5K views
• 54 this weekCreate a new list
List your movie, TV & celebrity picks.
- 320 titles
- StarsVolodymyr ZelenskyyValerii Fedorovych ZaluzhnyiVitali Klitschko'Ukraine on Fire 2' is one-minute docu-series about the Russia's war on Ukraine.
- DirectorVyacheslav BihunStarsYuriy YatsenkoPyotr ZaikinMaria TomakTraveling to a neighbouring country, a remarkable young man becomes a political prisoner: his body and soul are put to test, manifesting the spirit of his nation.
- DirectorVyacheslav BihunStarsOleksandr KolodyazhnyyOleksandr TyschykJuliaA Ukraine's epic story about two families torn by war.
- DirectorAskold KurovStarsOleh SentsovVladimir PutinVictor YanukovichA documentary about Ukrainian film director Oleg Sentsov, arrested by the Russian FSB in Crimea and sentenced to 20 years in prison on contrived charges.
- DirectorVyacheslav BihunStarsVladyslava GavryliukBoris UkrainskyLidia Golovataja"Passion" is a metaphorical story about a lady visited by the twin brother of her beloved: love turns into chaos, sin and atonement.
- DirectorSergey LoznitsaStarsValeriu AndriutaLiya AkhedzhakovaRoza KhayrullinaA woman lives in a small village in Russia. One day she receives the parcel she sent to her husband, serving a sentence in prison. Confused and angered, she sets out to find why her package was returned to sender.
- DirectorKostiantyn KliatskinStarsYuriy ChmelykVolodymyr DubovyiMykola LytvynenkoA story of the officers, soldiers and seamen who have not betrayed their oath of loyalty to the people of Ukraine during the takeover of Crimea. This is a film about a military honor, in the midst of undeclared war.
- DirectorVyacheslav BihunStarsVyacheslav BihunJustyn Bihun-SikorskyA documentary visualizes a candid personal letter to Andrei Tarkovsky.
- StarsAleksey GorbunovAkhtem SeitablaevBogdan YusipchukThe events of the series begin during Euromaidan, where the heroes found themselves on different sides of the barricades, and when the Russian intervention in Ukraine began, former opponents found themselves in the National Guard.
- DirectorVyacheslav BihunA man decides whether to accept a call to protect his country's independence in a new war. Joining a special intelligence unit, he is testing his destiny with allies and enemies with a slight but sweet chance for reward.
- DirectorMarina StepanskaStarsChristian BorysOleh MosiichukDaria PlakhtiiTwo bewildered young Ukrainians, part of the post-revolutionary generation seeking their place, meet at a pivotal moment and experience a few days of happiness together.
- DirectorIgor ParfenovStarsEllen SlusarchiAn epic drama about events in Maidan and the war in Ukraine. Maidan's shooting bothers an ex-activist - his friend was killed. Looking for the guilty he was captured with his friend by Field Commander "Ideologist" who has occupied the part of Ukraine and established his own rules there, lynches and does not obey the law. Hostages were taken as prisoners by the family of three brother-terrorists, who were trying to exchange them during 6 days. Otherwise they will be killed. But the sequence of the conflicts is tearing up the militant's family inside.
- DirectorIgor ParfenovThis epic film has three chapters 'The Lawlessness', 'The Revolution', 'The War' and tells about the man's destiny in Ukraine.
- DirectorLeonid KanterIvan YasniyStarsBohemaHatyloThis is a story of a new Ukrainian army and new Ukrainian society being born. After Maidan revolution Ukrainian volunteer warriors defend Donetsk Airport from pro-Russian separatists and Russian militaries.
- DirectorVitaliy ManskiyRussian citizen and Soviet-born Ukrainian native Vitaly Mansky crisscrosses Ukraine to explore Ukrainian society after the Maidan revolution as mirrored within his own large Ukrainian family. They live scattered all across the country: in Lviv, Odessa, the separatist area in Donbas, and Sevastopol on Crimea. The film is looking for reasons of the conflict after which citizens of a single country found themselves on a different sides of barricades including director's own family. The main narrative takes place in the here and now, starting with the turning point of ex-president Victor Yanukovych's flight to Russia. But below the main narrative there is a strong historical undercurrent, because the lives of protagonists of the film are marked by history on every step they take. This undercurrent will carry information about the Russian-Ukrainian conflict's deep roots in centuries of close ties between the two countries.
- DirectorElena VolochineJames KeoghOleg's Choice is a rare immersion into the private lives and thoughts of Russian combatants who have chosen to fight on the separatists side in Ukraine. Since the summer of 2014, thousands of young Russians poured into the Donbas region. Driven by Russian propaganda, they believed they were fulfilling their patriotic duty. Among the first wave of volunteers were Oleg and Max. Oleg was appointed deputy commander of a battalion, while Max became a soldier. Their illusions were shattered on the night of June 3rd 2015, when a battle went horribly wrong. While Oleg and Max continue to fight on the ground, they must also fight creeping doubts that they have that they ended up on the wrong side of the war. The film follows their introspection over the long term; the confession they have gone adrift, the search for meaning, the shock at realizing they have been misled - that they themselves have made mistakes to the frantic rhythm of a war that crushes bodies and reason. It is the story of the human face of a lie that confuses those involved. In this war rewritten by propaganda, where two parallel realities confront each other, they try in their own different ways to find a raison d'être. This is a human story on the borders of good and evil, where men are confronted by their own choices.
- DirectorMantas KvedaraviciusStarsMaryna ArkhipovaOleksandr BuliOleksandr DzhenchakoA man repairs his shing net and goes out to the bridge. Two trams run into each other - nobody is hurt and cables are xed the same day. A small concert is given for factory workers and the sincere performance of a violinist makes them cry. Bombs fall into the sea, no one notices.
- DirectorAlina GorlovaStarsOksana YakubovaWhat is left backstage of the heroic videos of our warriors in Ukraine? What do they have to face, one on one, in peaceful life, and where does the war stop?
- DirectorYevhen TitarenkoWar with Russia on the east of Ukraine through the director's lens who stayed for a year in the centre of the conflict zone. He became a paramedic volunteer and continued filming everything what was happening in front of his eyes, making a rare true document of this brutal war that continues to happen in the centre of Europe.
- DirectorNicholas RooneyStarsNicholas RooneyDocumentary Film 'The Pillars of Heaven' A young and disillusioned British diplomat abandons his diplomatic career, spends his own money, and risks his very life on a journey of faith and war in Ukraine. A country riven in pieces by indescribable events, sometimes called: an EU inspired and US -organised revolution, a Russian invasion, a civil war, a war of lies and misinformation, a war where thousands of people have died, and which created over a million refugees, and a war at the heart of Christendom which rips the very geopolitical foundations of Europe to shreds. With the Ukrainian people (including soldiers, military priests, peacekeepers, humanitarian aid workers, refugees, church leaders, politicians/ 'terrorists', ordinary families and everyday victims of the war) as his guide, his journey takes him from the idyllic Carpathian Mountains, to the golden cupolas in Kiev to the very heart of the hellish War-zone in Donetsk. He embarks on an odyssey from Christmas Eve to the Epiphany, searching for the soul of this troubled nation and for something which might help to bring a lasting end to the bloodshed and prevent a wider military confrontation between Russia and the West.
- DirectorAnastasiia StarozhitskaMariia StarozhitskaThe story of war, love and death that was documented by the immediate participants of events. Off screen and later on it are the two - a boy and a girl. He volunteered for the front; she went to the place just after the battle. He got into Ilovaysk cauldron, lost his closest brother-soldiers. She, while travelling along the ruined towns, strives to understand the essence of war and love. Both tell openly one another about their feelings during the war, escaping the cauldron, a try to live together after, and a common trip to the frontline.
- DirectorMark Jonathan HarrisOles SaninBREAKING POINT: The War for Democracy in Ukraine looks at people transformed by a democratic revolution, who give up their normal lives to fight a Russian invasion, in a war which has killed 10,000 and displaced 1.9 million Ukrainians.
- DirectorDamian KolodiyA first person chronological portrait of the recent revolution in Ukraine escalating with a war with Russia that threatens global stability.
- DirectorTaras RybalchenkoLidiya HuzhvaStarsStanislav BoklanGeorgi FominLidiya HuzhvaTwo soldiers in the whirlpool of war. A woman and a wounded man. What is stronger, spirit or metal? The will to live or the quirks of fate? Everything is just beginning.
- DirectorErnes SarykhalilovStarsMaksym PasichnykMustafa DzhemilevMustafa Dzhemilev - who is he? According to Wikipedia, he's politician and public figure. However, what kind of spirit is hiding behind his legendary personality, confident pace and silent smile? Mustafa Dzhemilev's history is a symbol of peaceful resistance against injustice and discrimination in the post-Soviet region. In the future, the documentary about the great leader's life history will enables the viewers to rethink his way, which passed through the Soviet times, Ukrainian independence and the Crimea occupation. Documentary about Mustafa Dzhemilev will be a guide to the struggle for human rights and justice. Documentary film 'Mustafa' lasting 90 minutes, which shows the history of Mr. Dzhemilev's life, which includes his struggle for returning to Crimea from the exile places during the Soviet Union, the trial course against him in the USSR, his experience of over 15 years as a political prisoner in a Soviet labor camps and his long hunger strike in human history. The film also features the return of Crimean Tatars to their motherland after the Soviet collapse. It shows Mr. Dzhemilev's struggle with the problem of the Crimea occupation in 2014.