In 1942, Belarus is in the hands of Nazis and the local militia. Sushenya is taken from his house in the middle of the night by Burov and his sidekick Voitik, two partisan fighters hiding out in the hills and forest. Sushenya is the only one of four captured rail workers who has been allowed to live by the occupying Germans after seemingly sabotaging the rail tracks. With the village and even his wife turned against him as a collaborator, Sushenya accepts what must happen next until the Germans suddenly appear and he is - perhaps - given a second chance, leaving space for doubt both on his betrayal and on the legitimacy of punishment by death. The three – and later two – men walk in the wood, exhausted, fleeing death from the Nazis while discussing and living the moral dilemmas of treason, heroism, guilt and revenge.
Shot by Oleg Mutu in sumptuous long takes and vibrant colour, In the Fog ultimately questions the corruption of man’s very humanity in the context of war.
Official Selection, Cannes Film Festival
FIPRESCI Award, Cannes 2012
Golden Apricot, Yerevan Film Festival
The DVD and Blu-ray also contains the short film Letter by Sergei Loznitsa
Sergei Loznitsa Director
Filmography Selected
Born in 1964 in Belarus, Sergei Loznitsa grew up in Kiev where he studied applied mathematics and later worked as a researcher on artificial intelligence.
He then decided to study directing at the Moscow Institute of Cinematography (VGIK), graduating in 1997. He has been making award-winning documentaries since 1996, and in 2010 he completed his first feature film My Joy, premiered in the main competition of the Cannes Film Festival, to great critical acclaim. In The Fog is his second feature film. It received its international premiere at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival and was widely praised by the critics and public alike.
Feature-Length Fiction Films
2012 In the Fog
2010 My Joy
Feature-Length Documentaries
2008 Revue
2008 Northern Light
2005 Blockade
2003 Landscape
2001 Settlement
Documentary Shorts
2012 O Milagre de Santo Antonio
2006 Artel
2004 Factory
2002 Portrait
2000 The Train Stop
1998 Life, Autumn
1996 Today We Are Going to Build a House
See links to the films at: www.loznitsa.com/en/films.html
FILM OF THE MONTH
"Lets us grasp the poisoned reality of life under occupation...A solemn moral epic...
"In its thorough meditation on man's moral place, and its beautiful depiction of one version of life's trail, lies this film's joy." Hannah McGill, SIGHT & SOUND
"A historical drama...that concerns characters with complex moral dilemas and explores the indistinct line between fate and free will." Anna Formicheva, SIGHT & SOUND in interview with director Sergei Loznitsa
'Shot by Oleg Mutu with an exquisite eye for atmosphere…there’s a strong feeling of authenticity to this defined world that’s rare in World War II film.
'Magnificently evocative…I loved every one of its 73 shots.'
Nick James, SIGHT & SOUND
'A delicately complex work of shifting perspectives....'Among the handful of truly eloquent and moving films here'
“Loznitsa’s war film is a superbly constructed anecdote, at once simple and troublingly complex. One of the films I most want to see again in 2013.”
Jonathan Romney, SIGHT & SOUND (Cannes Film Festival 2012 blog)
★★★★
“In 2010 Sergei Loznitsa attracted a lot of attention with his impressive first feature, MY JOY...Loznitsa looks set to garner even more praise...Loznitsa knows that war exists and won’t go away; rather than indulging in patriotic or pacifist platitudes, he tries to show what it might do to our souls. And in this writer's opinion, he succeeds.”Geoff Andrew
TIME OUT
★★★★
“The Ukrainian director and former documentary-maker Sergei Loznitsa scored a succes d’estime with his first fiction feature MY JOY. Now he has returned with a mysterious, compelling story from the Nazi-occupied Soviet Union in 1942...
‘In the Fog is an intense, slow-burning and haunting drama.’Peter Bradshaw,
THE GUARDIAN
Read the full review
“IN THE FOG paints in simple terms a complex picture of survival, compromise, betrayal and integrity. The film is impeccably acted and its clarity and economy are positively Tolstoyan”.
“A Russian drama about truth, honour and betrayal, and one of the very best war movies of recent years.”
Jonathan Romney, THE INDEPENDENT / THE INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY
More links and round-ups at Fandor.com
‘In the Fog is a splendour, struck by beauty and intelligence.’
Jacques Mandelbaum, LE MONDE
★★★★
“A beautifully rigorous piece which will delight cineastes.. It’s Loznitsa’s intellectual approach and his technical team’s interpretation that mark IN THE FOG... This very Russian tragedy is a jewel which will surely only burnish with time.”
Fionnula Halligan
SCREEN INTERNATIONAL
'Masterful up to the very end'Ariane Allard,
Positif (February 2013)
