How to Divorce During the War highlights how families can be torn apart, sometimes because of politics (Film review)

Display of posters of films, including that for How to Divorce 

During the War, screened at the 50th Hong Kong

International Film Festival 

 

  

Lithuanian filmmaker Andrius Blaževičius at the Q&A

session after a Hong Kong International Film Festival 

screening of his film 

 

How to Divorce During the War (Lithuania-Luxembourg-Ireland, 2025)

- Andrius Blaževičius, director-scriptwriter

- Starring: Marius Repšys, Žygimantė Elena Jakštaitė, Amelija Adomaitytė

- Part of the HKIFF's Young Cinema Competition (World) program 

 

I don't know if others feel the same way about this but How to Divorce During the War strikes me as a title for an absurdist comedy rather than, say, an utterly serious drama.  As it turned out though, there is very little to laugh about in this work, set in 2022 Lithuania, about a nuclear family whose world is turned upside down by the parents splitting around the time that the Russians attacked Ukraine.

 

Vitas (played by Marius Repšys) is a filmmaker who spends more time daily cleaning the family home and being the main caregiver for pre-teen daughter Dovile (essayed by Amelija Adomaityte) than on the latest script that he's working on but has writer's block over.  In the eyes of his high-flying media exec spouse, Marija (Žygimantė Elena Jakštaitė), he is a shadow of the interesting, intelligent man that she married -- and so she wants out.  (She's also in a lesbian relationship with a colleague who seems to have egged her to divorce her husband.)

 

Since their house was in Marija's name, she had the legal right to ask Vitas to move out of it.  Which he reluctantly did.  Their daughter Dovile stays with Marija while Vitas moves back in with his parents, who he finds increasingly hard to get along with; especially after he finds -- via their doing such as spouting pro-Russian propaganda about the Ukraine war -- that they do not share his political views, which are more aligned with that of his now-ex-wife along with their daughter.

 

Consequently, Vitas finds himself part of not just one but two families at war with themselves at a low point in his professional life.  And, truly, it's hard not to feel for him.  And, also, Doville.  Who doesn't say much but watches, observes and knows far more -- about the family situation and also what's going on in the world at large -- than her parents and other adults may realise.  

 

On the other hand, Marija is not always as easy to have sympathy for; and is someone whose actions I sometimes could understand but I disagreed with at others.  The most complex character in the movie, it is through her that one is shown the domestic and internal conflicts that can arise from a woman becoming the main provider of the family -- something that still is the exception rather than the rule.  Also the conflict that a working person has with regards to how much one should -- or, maybe the better word is can -- professionally and financially sacrifice for one's ideological beliefs.  

 

My sense is that many Hongkongers who viewed this film will most relate to Vitas: particularly, his experiences with his parents.  Because of what happened here in 2019 and after China imposed a national security law on Hong Kong (in 2020), and how what happened were covered and portrayed by media on different sides of the political equation, conflicts (have) ensued between many parents and their (adult) offspring; and resulted in the breaking up of families -- or, at the very least, an increasing number of (adult) offspring deciding to move out of family abodes to live on their own.    

 

Part of me wanted to ask How to Divorce During the War's director-scriptwriter, Andrius Blaževičius, whether he was aware of Hong Kong's situation during the Q&A that was held after the screening I attended of his film.  Also, whether he knew that many Hongkongers feel a kinship with Ukrainians (and why).  But while I didn't, I do get the sense that he wasn't entirely clueless about why this sensitive dramatic offering is one that can resonate with people here even though they live thousands of kilometers away from Lithuania and Ukraine.

 

My rating for this film: 7.0 

Two Prosecutors tells a tale that's sadly predictable but chilling all the same (Film review)

 

Poster for the ninth film I viewed at the 

50th Hong Kong International Film Festival 

 

Two Prosecutors (France-Germany-Netherlands-Latvia-Romania-Lithuania-Ukraine, 2025) 

- Sergei Loznitsa, director and co-scriptwriter (with Georgy Demidov)

- Starring: Alexander Kutznetsov, Aleksandr Filippenko, Anatoliy Beliy 

- Part of the HKIFF's The Masters program 

 

For much of Two Prosecutors, one only sees a single prosecutor on screen: Kornev (portrayed by Alexander Kutznetsove, whose nose looks like that of someone who emerged much the worse from a brutal boxing match or game of rugby!), a young government prosecutor only three months into his career.  Naive and idealistic, after coming into possession of a letter written in blood by a political prisoner, he decides to go see and hear the man: a former local party stalwart who had visited and given a speech about truth and Bolshevism at Kornev's law school.

 

Despite the prison head trying to dissuade him from doing so in multiple ways, Kornev stubbornly persists in meeting with a man considered so dangerous that he's been put in solitary confinement far away from other prisoners and watched over by multiple guards.  This despite  Stepniak (essayed by Aleksandr Filippenko) being elderly and physically weak, and, in fact being pretty close to death's door. 

 

It's pretty obvious that Stepniak has been physically tortured, and so badly that his internal organs are badly messed up.  It's less certain why the old Bolshevik ended up being among the victims of what looked to have been a power struggle that saw the NKVD (secret police; precursor of the KGB) infiltrate and take control of the Communist Party apparatus in their city of Bryansk. In any case, Stepniak adamantly maintained that if only his tale was told to Joseph Stalin, he would be freed and wrongs righted.  And asks Kornev to do just that.  Or, at the very least, appeal to someone in the central government over in Moscow to come clean up the locally centered mess.

 

Kornev, an upright, card-carrying member of the Communist Party, agrees to do so.  And journeys to Moscow to report all this to the man who's effectively his top boss: the Procurator General, Andrey Vyshinsky (Anatoli Beliy plays the film's second titular prosecutor, and real life historical figure).  But when they meet... well, let's just say that this scene is as chilling, if more so, than the moments when Stepniak shows Kornev the torture marks on his body as well as arms and legs.

 

Those who know that 1937, the year that Two Prosecutors is set, was the height of what's known as Stalin's Great Terror (or Purge) will have known early on where this film adaptation of a novella by Georgy Demidov, a Soviet physicist-writer-political prisoner was heading.  But it's the journey, rather than the destination, that really matters with regards to this tale. And director Loznitsa masterfully keep's one attention and stokes one's mounting horror regarding how things will end for the honorable Kornev for this gripping work's entire running time.   

 

By the way, that director Loznitsa was unable to make this film in his native Ukraine or Russia tells you speaks volumes about the current state of those parts of the former Soviet Union.  Equally clear is how Two Prosecutors is a strong indictment of the kind of regime that punishes righteous and idealistic folks who seek to do good unto one's fellow citizens. 

 

My rating for this film: 7.5  

The Hong Kong Way of protest

Just a very small part of the very long chains formed 

by participants of the Hong Kong Way this evening

 Thank you, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia,

for inspiring us with your Baltic Way of 1989

At lunchtime today, thousands of accountants -- yes, accountants! -- marched through the streets of central Hong Kong to voice their opposition to the not-yet-withdrawn extradition bill that would allow people in Hong Kong to be legally extradited to Mainland China from more than just the West Kowloon Terminus of the cross-border Express Rail Link.  Then, this evening, Hong Kongers took a page from an amazing show of unity cum mega political demonstration which took place 30 years ago in the Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia to form their own "human chains" along northern Hong Kong Island and on the other side of Victoria Harbour as far west as Kwai Hing and as far east as Lam Tin, and for good measure, all the way up to the top of the iconic Lion Rock peak! 

The Hong Kong Way was yet another creative -- and peaceful -- way for Hong Kongers to come together and collectively voice their grievances against the government (including the police).  It also constituted a show of unity and strength for a protest movement that began with people turning up as far back as March 31st for a protest march against the proposed extradition bill but really got going in early June, with a 1 million-strong protest march on the 9th of that month.  

Some 75 days on, the protests clearly still have the support of a good percentage of Hong Kongers; as can be seen by enough people turning out to clog miles and miles of streets as well as Victoria Park on a stormy afternoon last Sunday and what must be tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people turning up in -- and from -- various parts of the territory to take part in the Hong Kong Way this evening.  Furthermore, a good number of people passing by my section of the Hong Kong Way this evening -- be it in trams, buses, taxis or private cars, or on motorbikes, bicycles or foot -- were showing their support by doing such as vocally shouting out their encouragement, tooting their vehicles' horns and, in the case of a bus driver, putting up "Eye4HK" messages where one usually sees route information being indicated on his vehicle.

One might be moved to wonder why those people didn't actually take part in this protest even though they support it.  Sadly, fear clearly is a factor; what with Beijing pressuring many companies to toe the line, including by firing employees who take part in protests, even those that are legal and Beijing-backed -- not just pro-Beijing -- thugs targeting protesters (but often ending up indiscriminately attacking people in the area).  Indeed, it was quite noticeable this evening that a number of passengers on passing buses and trams sought to show their support of the Hong Kong Way in ways that wouldn't draw too much attention from the other passengers seated near them.

In contrast, the one bus passenger who decided to show his opposition to the protest by flipping us the bird did so very openly as well as rudely -- though he wasn't brave enough to accept our suggestion that he come down from his perch on the upper deck and off the bus into our midst!  And for the record: a convoy of taxis with big China flags sticking from them also drove by us; many of them empty of passengers and, strangely, with their "For hire" signs still on!

Rather than dampen our spirits though, the sight of those taxis actually got Hong Kong protesters displaying our distinctive sense of humor once more since they got greeted by shouts -- in English -- of "Free China"!  And to put things in context: over the course of the two hours that this event took place, taxis also did drive by whose drivers showed their support of the protesters by honking their horns in a particular pattern that we've come to recognize and giving the thumbs up signal.

In a bid to (further) raise international awareness of this protest movement that's now also calling for genuine universal suffrage for Hong Kong, there were orchestrated shouts of English of "Free Hong Kong" and "Democracy now" (along with other chants in Cantonese, the most popular on the night of which was "Hong Kong yan, ga yau!").  There also were attempts to get people to belt out the original English version of Do You Hear the People Sing? (rather than the Cantonese one).  Still, it has to be said that people seemed far more comfortable singing another song that's come to be associated with Hong Kong pro-democracy protests: Beyond's Boundless Oceans, Vast Skies; a beautiful English version of which exists, courtesy of a Brazilian man! :)