Ukraine wins its first ever Oscar with ‘20 Days in Mariup’ documentary

According to Ukrinform, Mstyslav Chernov's documentary about the first days of the Russian siege of Mariup city in the Donetsk region, was also nominated for Best International Feature Film.

This film was created in claboration with the Associated Press and American documentary filmmakers from Frontline. The film was shot inside the besieged city of Mariup during the first days of the Russian invasion.

According to Suspilne, at the award ceremony, Mstyslav Chernov said: "This is the first Oscar in Ukrainian history, and I’m honored. Probably I will be the first director on this stage to say I wish I’d never made this film, I wish to be able to exchange this to Russia never attacking Ukraine.”

He was joined on stage by photojournalist Evgen Maletka and producer Vasilisa Stepanenko, who worked with the director in besieged Mariup in 2022. "This is the first Oscar in history to be awarded to the authors of a Ukrainian film," the report says.

The Oscar ceremony was broadcast in more than 200 countries. In Ukraine, the exclusive broadcast was provided by Suspilne Culture.

As Ukrinform reported earlier, the Ukrainian documentary “20 Days in Mariup”, which tells the story of the besieged city from February 24, 2022, is a debut of war correspondent photographer, videographer and writer Mstyslav Chernov. The film invved the works of Evgen Maletka and producer and journalist Vasilisa Stepanenko. They won the Pulitzer Prize for their work in Mariup.

In addition, Maletka, Chernov and Stepanenko won the Shevchenko Prize for their series of journalistic materials about the siege of Mariup (reports, photo and video reports, investigations and the film 20 Days in Mariup).

The film was premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, an independent-film festival held in the United States, in the World Cinema Documentary Competition section, and won the Audience Award.

The Ukrainian premiere took place at the Docudays UA festival, where 20 Days in Mariup won the best film in the National Competition and the Audience Award.

The film also won awards at the Cleveland International Film Festival (USA), DocAviv (Israel), Sheffield DocFest (UK), DocEdge (New Zealand), Cinema for Peace (Germany), and the Royal Television Society (UK).

In its first week of release in Ukraine, 20 Days in Mariup raised over UAH 530,000 and became the highest-grossing Ukrainian documentary film in history.

President of Ukraine Vodymyr Zelensky noted the important re of the documentary 20 Days in Mariup in countering Russian praganda and thanked its creators.