Belarus-born director Daria Zhuk will follow her feature debut, “Crystal Swan,” with “Exactly What It Seems,” a dark, satirical sci-fi thriller about modern tyranny.
The film is produced by Volya Chaikoskaya and Ivo Felt (Estonia) and Violeta Krechetova of Allfilm, and is based on the original short story by Tatsiana Zamyrovskaya, who will co-write the screenplay. It will be shot in Belarusian, English and Russian.
Allfilm, which Felt co-founded, is also behind the Oscar-nominated “Tangerines” and Klaus Haro’s Golden Globe-nominated “The Fencer.”
In Exactly As It Seems, a couple—Nadia and Fedor—are seeking political asylum in the United States. They find themselves unexpectedly transported to Belarus by a mysterious quantum technology created by scientists under the dictatorship. Hunted like criminals through the forests of their homeland, they must repair their dysfunctional relationship to ensure their safe return.
“It is not a film based on visual effects, but a realistic version of our reality with one assumption: that this technology exists and everyone who feels nostalgic for Belarus can be instantly transported there. But it seems that it works only in one way, only Belarusian memories are stored on the server,” Zhuk said. diverse.
“Unfortunately, for some people, this technology is their worst nightmare. My heroes are wanted for their political activism in their homeland, so it is not safe for them to return.”
Together with Tatiana Zamirovskaya, Zhuk decided to use this genre to “attack” issues that might be difficult to digest through a more realistic drama.
“The satire and science fiction are great at creating the right distance from the harsh reality of the current dictatorial regime and examining the recent emotional trauma of the failed revolution in Belarus in 2020,” said Jock. “We also look forward to opening this story up to a wider audience who may not know anything about the current events.”
Earlier, Zhuk's 2018 film “Crystal Swan,” about a young female DJ in the 1990s hoping to achieve her American dream, was selected by Belarus for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscars, the country's first nomination in 22 years.
“It opened a lot of doors,” she recalled.
Since then, she has written and directed for Apple TV+, FX/Hulu, Netflix (police drama “Zato”) and Amazon Europe (“Russian Affairs”), with some of those works — like Apple’s “Little America” — being “very personal.”
“While filming Crystal Swan, my team and I reinvented the process of making a film without the support of a local film fund. We look forward to doing it again with this project – on a larger scale and in a tougher political climate.”
“Exactly What It Seems” will be in “dialogue” with her previous work.
“The film deals with the tortured relationship with my homeland and the cracks of the American dream as experienced by new immigrants,” said Jock, who studied filmmaking at Harvard and then Columbia University.
“It’s a dystopian sci-fi drama that explores themes of toxic nostalgia and the search for identity against the backdrop of a totalitarian regime. I realized that my main character, Filia, in “Crystal Swan” was also searching for her identity, lost in the abyss of being from Belarus but wanting to be free in America. But now, there’s a deeper need to examine the core of who you are and your deepest fears.”
Belarus-born, Estonia-based producer Volya Chajkosskaya has been selected for this year’s Match Me! initiative at Locarno and is developing “Mono,” a film about a woman trying to understand what happened to her when she lost half her hearing as a teenager.
“I am very excited about this project,” said Chagkosskaya, who has been blacklisted by the Belarusian regime. “It talks about my homeland, Belarus, which I haven’t visited in five years, and it addresses timely and global themes of totalitarian regimes, displacement and identity.”
“This project has a great team of amazing people and professionals who I have known for many years and whose work I love. I believe we will find the resources to bring this project to life as soon as possible.”
