Afterimage: Sergei Loznitsa

February 22–24, 2017

Ukrainian filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa joins us to present and discuss his work, including the award-winning Maidan and his latest, Austerlitz.

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Austerlitz
Maidan. Courtesy Cinema Guild

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Past Films

Maidan
- Friday, February 24 3:10 PM
Sergei Loznitsa
Ukraine/Netherlands, 2014
Composed from extended fixed shots, this account of Kiev’s Maidan Square protests tracks the trajectory from peaceful dissent to violent confrontation. “A film of scale and immediacy, finding artistry in bearing witness” (New York Times).

Sergei Loznitsa and Neil Young in conversation
In the Fog
- Friday, February 24 7:30 PM
Sergei Loznitsa
Germany, Latvia, Russia, Netherlands, Belarus, 2012
Two partisans plan to kill a Belarusian railway worker suspected of Nazi sympathies in Loznitsa’s dreamlike narrative film. “A masterpiece” (David Thomson).

Sergei Loznitsa and Neil Young in conversation
Three Short Films By Sergei Loznitsa
- Thursday, February 23 3:10 PM
Witness contemporary Russia in these three shorts, from the rural village of Life, Autumn to Factory’s busy industrial floor and the tired commuters of Landscape.

Sergei Loznitsa and Neil Young in conversation
Austerlitz
- Thursday, February 23 7:30 PM
Sergei Loznitsa
Germany, 2016
Bay Area Premiere

Tourists wander amid a former concentration camp turned profit center in Loznitsa’s memorable investigation of the atrocity exhibition industry. “Brilliant” (Variety).

Sergei Loznitsa and Neil Young in conversation
Blockade
- Wednesday, February 22 7 PM
Sergei Loznitsa
Russia, Ukraine, 2005
Loznitsa reinterprets archival footage of the siege of Leningrad during World War II in this, “one of the most important Russian movies of the last decade” (Russian Review). With short The Old Jewish Cemetery.

Sergei Loznitsa and Neil Young in conversation

Afterimage: Sergei Loznitsa

February 22–24, 2017

Filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa (born in 1964 in Belarus and raised in Ukraine) has emerged this past decade as a thoughtful commentator on a range of political and socioeconomic issues related to Ukraine, Russia, and the former Soviet bloc countries. Originally trained in engineering and math, he was employed as a scientist at the Institute of Cybernetics before he applied to study at VGIK, the Russian State Institute of Cinematography in Moscow, in the mid-1990s. Today, Loznitsa is equally praised for his work in documentary and narrative film. On occasion, he mines archival footage to examine and reanimate historical events, such as the siege of Leningrad in Blockade. Most often, Loznitsa adopts an observational style, which allows his camera to show a situation rather than tell it. Loznitsa has also chosen to film many of his actualités on location—these works offer intimate views of contemporary life in rural Russia and the Eastern European region (The Old Jewish Cemetery; Life, Autumn; Factory; Landscape). Loznitsa’s cinema is carefully constructed, allowing viewers space to interpret what his films present and form their own opinions about the subject at hand. We are pleased to welcome film critic Neil Young (The Hollywood Reporter, Sight & Sound, Tribune, MUBI Notebook) as the guest moderator of this series.

Susan Oxtoby, Senior Film Curator

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Our programs with Sergei Loznitsa are presented as part of Afterimage: Filmmakers and Critics in Conversation, made possible by generous funding from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association®. We also wish to thank LA Filmforum for organizing Loznitsa’s visit to California, and the Mike Kelley Foundation for Visual Arts, ISEEES, and the Center for Jewish Studies at UC Berkeley for their support.

Afterimage: Sergei Loznitsa

February 22–24, 2017

Past Films

Maidan

In the Fog

Three Short Films By Sergei Loznitsa

Austerlitz

Blockade