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When Ukrainian production powerhouse Film.UA set a late-February release date for “Puppies,” an offbeat comedy about a woman afflicted with a strange curse that turns her lovers into canines, hopes were high for strong returns at the box office. Just last year, after all, a pair of the company’s comedies grossed more than $1 million domestically — an impressive take in a country still reeling from the ongoing Russian invasion and war.
What their forecast didn’t include, however, was the fallout from Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s disastrous visit to the White House that weekend. The heated meeting, in which President Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance attempted to bully the Ukrainian leader to “make a deal” with Russia or else lose American support, added to growing unease in Ukraine that the Trump administration would abandon its longtime ally. When “Puppies” hit theaters, it landed not with a bark, but a whimper.
“We saw a huge downturn in admissions compared to previous weekends,” says Film.UA CEO Victoria Yarmoshchuk. Citing the “turbulence” of the second Trump administration, which has rattled global markets and witnessed a realignment of U.S. foreign policy, Yarmoshchuk stressed that unpredictable global events — such as the showdown in the Oval Office or Trump’s chaotic tariffs rollout — “only add confusion” to a country, and an industry, longing for a return to the stable, predictable rhythms of the recent past.
“All this turbulence…brings a lot of uncertainty,” Yarmoshchuk says. “You cannot forecast how many people will come to your movie, how many people will watch your TV show. It all adds vulnerability to your market.” In times of uncertainty, she adds, “people tend to turn away from entertainment and concentrate more on their daily lives.”
More than three years since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, there is no end to the conflict in sight. In late April, President Trump again lashed out his Ukrainian counterpart on social media, insisting that President Zelenskyy “can have Peace or, he can fight for another three years before losing the whole Country,” after the Ukrainian leader rejected a U.S. peace plan that largely favors Russia. A Kremlin-brokered three-day ceasefire in early May unraveled within hours, prompting Ukrainian officials to label it a “farce.”
Markets are on a destructive roller-coaster ride across the globe, while inflation — and the cost of production — is rising. European partners who stepped up in the wake of Russia’s full-scale invasion to not only support the beleaguered Ukrainian screen industries, but the country’s humanitarian effort, are “trying to extend and increase their support,” says Darya Bassel, of Kyiv-based outfit Moon Man, who produced the Oscar-nominated “A House Made of Splinters.”
That largesse, however, is in increasingly short supply amid growing economic and geopolitical upheaval. “The budgets of many funds are being cut,” says Bassel. “Opportunities are shrinking.” “We are very much grateful for all the support that we got in the first year of the war,” agrees Oleksandr Bohutskyi, CEO of Starlight Media. “But now, the support is diminishing.”
The European Solidarity Fund for Ukrainian Films, launched at the 2023 European Film Market, remains “the only real opportunity to get decent financing for films,” Bassel says. The fund, which last year saw its budget increase to €1.5 million ($1.7 million), has supported 37 Ukrainian projects to date. But Bassel stresses that “it’s not enough to keep alive the whole industry.”
The producer, who is teaming up with France’s Vivement Lundi! and Luxembourg’s a_BAHN on the hybrid animated documentary “Red Zone,” says she’s “trying to work more with European broadcasters [and] international and European funds” to make up for a domestic shortfall. Producer Eugene Rachkovsky, of the Ukrainian film collective Tabor, whose Cannes Directors’ Fortnight premiere “Militantropos” is a co-production with Austria’s Mischief Films and France’s Les Valseurs, insists that the Ukrainian industry “still has huge support from the European countries,” as the continent continues to rally to the defense of a country that the U.S. seems increasingly determined to turn its back on.
Though Ukraine’s attempts to join the E.U. have stalled, European leaders insist they will continue to support the war effort. Last December, the country also became a full participant in the Creative Europe Media program, an E.U.-funded support mechanism that helps develop, distribute and promote European content.
Still, it remains to be seen how that support will translate to the country’s beleaguered screen industries, with cultural spending on the decline across the continent.
Domestic funding in Ukraine, meanwhile, has cratered since the invasion, with state financing largely diverted to the war effort. The Ukrainian State Film Agency, an independent entity that has been embroiled in controversy in recent years, is now in the process of falling under the mandate of the culture ministry. Currently, the USFA is not issuing any funding calls, a situation that Bassel says “doesn’t look very promising.”
Nevertheless, documentary production remains robust — as evidenced by Cannes Directors’ Fortnight selection “Militantropos,” from the Tabor film collective, and the recent Berlinale competition entry “Timestamp” — as Ukrainian documentary filmmakers continue to chronicle Russian atrocities in real time. And in the absence of state support, “private investors are very active [in film production],” according to Film.UA’s Yarmoshchuk, who insists, “Our people are very resilient.”
“It’s not the strongest who survive, but those who adapt,” says Starlight’s Bohutskyi. Last year, even as a Russian missile tore a hole through the company’s Kyiv studio, production was soon underway on the 15th season of “MasterChef Ukraine,” with Starlight getting a helping hand from rival Film.UA, which offered some of its own studio space. It’s a sign of what Bohutskyi describes as a wartime ethos of “promoting values of cooperation, of being able to rebuild and be partners with each other.”
While the prospects for an impending peace deal seem slim, Ukrainian film and TV professionals are already laying the groundwork for what their industry will look like in the post-war period. Daria Leygonie-Fialko, founder of the TV production company SPACE and co-founder of the Organization of Ukrainian Producers, anticipates “a huge flow of investment into content.” Yarmoshchuk says she likes to remind her overseas partners of the vast potential waiting to be tapped once a peace agreement with Russia is reached.
“Ukraine is a big market. It’s more than 30 million people,” she says. “This is what I keep saying to my international partners: ‘You really need to think about what you will do in Ukraine when the war ends.’”
“People are dying. Cities are being destroyed,” adds Bassel. “But we are still here.”
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