Anja and Serjoscha

Anja and Serjoscha sit on a pier framed by thick reeds. In front of them, rust-brown smokestacks of a factory building tower from the opposite shore. Anja´s orange hair shines in the evening sun; amused, she shows Serjoscha a few new sketches from her drawing pad and then asks if he would come with her if she were to move away.

The two, eighteen and nineteen years old, have been close friends since their school days. They live in Mariupol, a city in southeastern Ukraine on the Sea of Azov. "In April 2014 Russian-backed separatists captured the city. The Ukrainian army regained control of Mariupol in June 2014. The armed conflict in the eastern Ukraine continues until today." Thus begins Anja and Serjoscha, with this curt description. The gray residential complexes and ramshackle façades in this seaport near the frontline are a silent backdrop for the film, which does not have to go back into the past — a past that anyway projects into the present. In an unobtrusive closeness, Ivette Löcker traces the life circumstances of Anja and Serjoscha who are right in the middle of a fragile in between state, which is nonetheless, not one of mere silent contemplation or dull waiting: while Anja has a hard time looking for work, the two, who are more nonconforming and strong-willed than the others, openly practice social critique with a colorful artistic performance about gender stereotypes and sexism.
Shrewd humor and profound dialogue, exuberance and fear of the future alternate in snapshots unfolding bit-by-bit to reveal a searching movement. As the filmmaker says, Anja and Serjoscha is the "description of the status quo of a possible rebellion." (Jana Koch)

Translation: Lisa Rosenblatt