One Summer in Ukraine: film about Ronin Team fighters from International Legion

In the first five years of the ATO/Joint Forces Operation alone, about four thousand foreign volunteers took part in combat operations. Today, according to unofficial data, their number may reach 20,000, which is why the International Legion was organised. However, there are also separate national units within the Ukrainian Armed Forces. In the film One Summer in Ukraine, Volodymyr Tykhyy captures some of this diversity by putting guys from different countries in front of the camera. But he focuses on the stories of three soldiers: the Americans Murray, Waldo and Sessy. Murray is an instructor and commander. As they say, he is strict but fair, with a tattoo on his neck that reads Good Luck, Don't Die. Sessy and Waldo are inseparable buddies, both with moustaches, born on the same day - 1 October - but with diametrically opposite personalities. Sessy is a melancholic, while Waldo is more of a sanguine. The former gloomily admits: ‘I don't like civilian life, it's uncomfortable.’ The latter also dislikes peaceful boredom and describes breaking even as a normal activity with a carefree smile: ‘Woke up in the morning, went to work’; for him, success means “being happy in his work”, and he is indeed happy, and he has his own commandment on his chevron: Live Free, Die Hard. The involvement of foreign fighters in the war on the side of Ukraine has always been a hot topic, especially at the beginning of the full-scale invasion. There are many stories about foreigners in combat on the Internet. Tykhyy, however, chooses a different way of telling the story, which may even surprise you. He shows the frontline only in the last 10 minutes of the film. There are interspersed with TV news reports that demonstrate the level of military absurdity that has gripped Russia (special mention should be made of the work of Andriy Martynenko, who composed an extremely accurate mood soundtrack for this fragment and other episodes). However, the overwhelming majority of the film is a routine of preparations for war. Training, memories of life in the States, strong words and jokes like ‘Dudes, I have 40 thousand in debt, let me die already’ or ‘I'm sending you first because I don't love you’. And this is America itself. The film crew travels across the United States in the height of summer, stopping at important memorials: Arlington National Cemetery; the monument to the Marines who raised the American flag over Iwo Jima; the battleship Missouri, on board of which the Japanese surrender was signed. The Ukrainian filmmakers ask passers-by, ordinary Americans, what these places mean to them, what patriotism and historical memory mean to them, and how they perceive the war in general. Some are excited by the very opportunity to visit such a significant location, others are disgusted by the war as a phenomenon, and one unicum even blames all the troubles on a conspiracy of mysterious bankers. For all of these open and friendly citizens, patriotism and war are almost museum concepts. They are more like declarations that rarely intersect with everyday life. For Murray, however, love for the country is not about raising the flag on the lawn every morning, but about action, about doing something: ‘At least visit your veteran grandfather, help him with the shopping, listen to his story, do something.’ Tykhyy avoids the adrenaline of war reporting, moves away from the frontline here-and-now, focuses on these conversations and everyday trivialities for one purpose: to understand who these people are who leave the fortress of Western comfort and go under fire in Ukrainian landings. Sessy gives a possible answer: ‘We are all a bunch of nameless nobodies. Free in self-denial, victorious by nature.

Ronin is a wandering samurai who has lost his master. Ronin can become a robber, or he can remain a noble warrior. He has only one desire: to do the right thing.