Russians delayed risky Ukrainian film of Chernobyl

Press, 7 April 1987, Page 11

Russians delayed risky Ukrainian film of Chernobyl

NZPA-Reuter Moscow Ukrainian filmmakers risked exposure to radiation at the scene of the Chernobyl disaster when they shot a documentary that was suppressed for six months, the Ukrainian Communist Party newspaper “Pravda Ukrainy” reported. The newspaper said Vladimir Shevchenko, director of the film “Chernobyl: A Chronicle of Difficult Weeks,” fell ill while editing the documentary last autumn and later died. It did not specify whether he died of radiation sickness or when, but said he continued to work in spite of running a high temperature and died at the height of his creative power.

The newspaper said Shevchenko and two cameramen from a Ukrainian documentary studio were the first film team to arrive on the

scene after the explosion and fire at the nuclear power plant north of Kiev last April 26. It said they obtained a room in Chernobyl, a ghost town after the evacuation of all its inhabitants, and worked there from May to August. They shot some footage in the immediate vicinity of the fourth reactor where the blast occurred. The film itself was contaminated by radioactive particles which show up on screen as “the visible face of radiation”. “The film was ready last autumn,” “Pravda Ukrainy” said. “But the premiere took place only recently.”

It quoted a Soviet filmmaker, Jemma Firsova, as saying at a press screening on the eve of the premiere that the film showed the people who fought and won the battle against the effects of the nuclear accident at the price of tremendous ef-

fort. “But unfortunately we do not see the people through whose fault the film was shelved,” she said. The article gave no reason for the suppression or the names of those responsible. In Moscow, the documentary has not yet been shown to the public and the newspaper did not say whether the Ukraine premiere was followed by public screening there. It praised both the film and its director, saying Shevchenko had shown personal courage and had fulfilled his duty to the end as a Communist Party member and an artist. A number of other films on Chernobyl have been shown to the public, including a television documentary entitled “Warning,” broadcast nationally in February, and a screen documentary, “The Bell of Chernobyl,” now playing in Moscow.