In early March 2022, Russian forces took control of the village of Yahidne in northern Ukraine. Using the school as a base, they confined nearly 400 local residents, including 77 children, to the school basement. 

People stayed there for 27 days. 

While some villagers try to forget the traumatic experience, others continuously revisit the memories, seeking understanding and closure.

Laura van Zuylen about The Basement:

Scar on a healing body

A hideous case of the wrong place at the wrong time. Yahidne is so small, that the inhabitants themselves must have thought their village would be overlooked by the Russian troops. But that was not the case. Early March 2022 Yahidne became the terrain of horror, when the Russians occupied it to set up their headquarters in the local school building. Director Roman Blazhan’s beautiful documentary The Basement depicts what it was like for 400 people to be trapped in its basement for 27 days. But he doesn’t tell it straightforwardly. Like an onion the film shows you its insides layer by layer. 

Some explanatory sentences in the beginning of the movie feel like the short update you read in the newspaper. The children’s drawings on the walls, shown during a tour for French visitors, are shocking, but feel detached. A terrifying safari. A diary, kept by one of the prisoners, tells the events day by day. What makes The Basement special, is that the story doesn’t end there. Blazhan chooses to tell it as part of a bigger picture, a portrait of the village. Like a scar on a healing body. This is an excellent choice, because facts, such as that the youngest prisoner was 6 weeks and the oldest 93 years, capture the imagination when the people who lived it take the stage. What does it mean that young and old were trapped together? 

The villagers have different approaches to dealing with their trauma and since it happened so recently, it seems it hasn’t completely sunken in. As if they are getting used to the idea of being at war. They’re funny and moving. Some of them are sad, yes, but none are bitter. A woman starts to sing a song about Russian officers and is corrected by her husband. Three little boys named their “dumb” pet rats Lukashenko and Putin, and play soldier, pretending they’re the USSR vs Germany. “Oh no! We’re Ukrainians and we fight the Russians!” In one of the most gripping scenes youngsters from neighbouring villages come in to help rebuild the town. Banging electronic music played by a live DJ keeps the spirits up high. An old man dances for himself. This is what trauma looks like. But revival as well.