‘20 Days in Mariupol’ Selected for Shortlists for Documentary Feature Film, International Feature Film for the 96th Academy Awards
Photographer Evgeniy Maloletka picks his way through the aftermath of a Russian attack in Mariupol, Ukraine, Feb. 24, 2022. Still from FRONTLINE PBS and AP’s feature film “20 Days in Mariupol.” (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov) (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov)
20 Days in Mariupol, a documentary from FRONTLINE and The Associated Press chronicling Russia’s siege of the Ukrainian city, has been selected for the shortlists in two categories, Documentary Feature Film and International Feature Film, for the 96th Academy Awards.
The documentary is a visceral, first-person view of the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, told through the perspective of Ukrainian filmmaker and AP video journalist Mstyslav Chernov.
Described as “essential” and “a relentless and truly important documentary” by The New York Times and “a brave, visceral, merciless masterpiece” by The Guardian, the film follows Chernov and his AP colleagues Evgeniy Maloletka and Vasilisa Stepanenko as they become the last international journalists reporting from Mariupol amid Russian troops’ siege, and as they document what would become defining images of the war: dying children, mass graves, the bombing of a maternity hospital, and more.
Following a decorated run on the film festival circuit, the documentary had its U.S. broadcast premiere on PBS stations November 21 and is now available to stream online at pbs.org/frontline, in the PBS App and on FRONTLINE’s YouTube channel. FRONTLINE is produced at GBH in Boston.
Directed, written and produced by Chernov, produced and edited by FRONTLINE’s Michelle Mizner, alongside producers Raney Aronson-Rath (FRONTLINE’s editor-in-chief and executive producer) and Derl McCrudden (AP’s vice president of news and head of global news production), 20 Days in Mariupol previously received two Critics Choice Documentary Awards, five Cinema Eye Honors nominations, a duPont-Columbia Award nomination, the Sundance Film Festival’s World Cinema Documentary Competition Audience Award and the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA)’s NPO Audience Award.
Academy Award nominations will be announced Jan. 23, 2024, and the 96th Oscars will take place Mar. 10, 2024.
Stream 20 Days in Mariupol in full below:
