The Sundance Film Festival featured a particularly interesting and unique documentary by the name, The Russian Woodpecker, premiered captivating audiences and snagging the World Cinema Jury Prize: Documentary Winner. Set in Ukraine in the midst of social unrest and economic disparity, the documentary follows the story of a Chornobyl survivor, an eccentric artist by the name of Fedor Alexandrovich.  Tying in current events at the time of this films making, the documentary explores the failed Russian Duga-3 signal, an over-the-horizon radar signal that pulsated through large parts of the world from 1976 to 1989.

  The documentary, in one defining word, is strange.  The kind of strange that is harder to define than it is to examine.  Scenes were dark, comical, and out of the ordinary in every way. At certain points, such as a scene with a hidden camera and stereotypical drunk Russian ex-KGB agent, I couldn’t help but question the authenticity of the filmmaking.  The meanings behind the documentary were evasive, it’s a film that leaves you with more questions than when you walked in.

  What is clear from the beginning, is that it is Alexandrovich’s perspective that the director, Chad Gracia, is trying to capture. The film’s focus is on Alexandrovich’s mission to expose the truth behind the Duga system, and ultimately the Chornobyl nuclear plant meltdown.  The Duga system was a secret cold war weapon designed to control western communication systems, with some radical theories lingering in society that the weapon could control minds.  Eerie scenes of Chornobyl and the Duga leave you with chills running down your back. Alexandrovich and his team set off on a mission to try to uncover if the Duga is in fact a cold war weapon, and if the Chernobyl nuclear plant meltdown was somehow orchestrated by the former Soviet Union.

  The conclusion the team arrives at is terrifying and the ending leaves you dumb-founded as to what you just watched. My first act when I finished watching this documentary was a quick google search on this mysterious “Russian Woodpecker” signal and found out, disturbingly enough, that it exists.  It wasn’t until the director and the two stars of the film walked on stage that some of my questions were answered.

  After being pulled through a train wreck of emotion during this screening, the importance of the filmmaker’s message solidified. Originally intended to be a five minute documentary short, Gracia became captivated with Alexandrovich’s story.  There are several social issues that turned Ukraine on its side during the making of the documentary.  With Alexandrovich’s message strongly anti-USSR, and with the today’s Russian government noticeably beefing up militarily and making bold moves into Ukraine, Garcia saw an opportunity to expose the evils of the old USSR and how it still lingers in the region to this day.

  Eccentric and weird, dark and yet a comedy, The Russian Woodpecker will leave you captivated and asking questions you never have before.