Every Death Diminishes Me
Sergii is a Ukrainian filmmaker who was preparing his debut feature film - until the war turned him into a paramedic and a documentary storyteller. Instead of fictional characters, he now films real people on the frontlines. Instead of a film set - evacuations, rescues, sleepless nights, exhaustion. Alongside him is Bono, a Dutch volunteer who left his quiet life in Europe to join the evacuation team in Ukraine. Their unlikely partnership reflects the moral clarity of action amid chaos - and the shared vulnerability that transcends borders.
Sergii’s voice remains off-screen, yet his presence is constant - through diary entries, fragments of the unfinished script, and his journeys to Europe, where he tries to pitch the film at festivals. The deeper he moves between these worlds, the more visible the rupture becomes: Ukraine, where people die every day, and Europe, which has grown tired of looking.
The title becomes literal: each loss takes away a part of the author himself. The film’s space contracts, his voice changes, and with it, the film itself transforms.
This is not a war film in the conventional sense - there are no combat scenes. It is a film about a man caught between the frontline and the festival market. Someone who not only saves the wounded but also searches for a language to speak to a world that no longer wants to listen.
It is a documentary attempt to hold together two realities - before the thread that connects them breaks entirely.
The ending is open: Sergii’s shift is over, he drives off, while the soldiers and medics he leaves - some alive, some forever still - fade in the mirror.
Sergii’s voice remains off-screen, yet his presence is constant - through diary entries, fragments of the unfinished script, and his journeys to Europe, where he tries to pitch the film at festivals. The deeper he moves between these worlds, the more visible the rupture becomes: Ukraine, where people die every day, and Europe, which has grown tired of looking.
The title becomes literal: each loss takes away a part of the author himself. The film’s space contracts, his voice changes, and with it, the film itself transforms.
This is not a war film in the conventional sense - there are no combat scenes. It is a film about a man caught between the frontline and the festival market. Someone who not only saves the wounded but also searches for a language to speak to a world that no longer wants to listen.
It is a documentary attempt to hold together two realities - before the thread that connects them breaks entirely.
The ending is open: Sergii’s shift is over, he drives off, while the soldiers and medics he leaves - some alive, some forever still - fade in the mirror.