The Distant Barking of Dogs

One World Festival

Ten-year-old Oleg grew up in the village of Hnutove in the east of Ukraine, just a few hundred metres from the front line. He recently lost his mother and lives only with his grandmother and younger cousin Yurik.

Fighting has been ongoing in the east of Ukraine for almost four years. Many have left the impoverished cities and villages on the front line. Not everyone has a place to go. The house of Oleg, Yurik and their grandmothers shakes with the explosions of rockets and grenades almost every night. Everyone must always be ready to run into the makeshift bunker in the cellar. Despite the horrors occurring around them, the boys and their grandmothers are trying to live normal lives. The camera follows Oleg over the course of a year, but he does not run away. What traces does omnipresent war gradually leave in the soul of a ten-year-old boy?