The Ukrainian film Photo to Remember will make its debut as the film that opens the International Documentary Film Festival in Amsterdam (IDFA) on 8 November 2023. In addition, Olha Chernykh's film has been included in the Envision competition programme.

According to the Suspilne Kultura agency, Photo to Remember is a joint project of Ukraine, France, and Germany. The film was supported by the IDFA Bertha Fund and the European Solidarity Fund for Ukrainian Cinema (ESFUF).

The film tells the story of one family's journey through the trials of war. The characters focus on the search for ways to overcome the losses that have happened to three generations of women in the director's family: the director herself, her mother and her grandmother, who remained in the occupied region.

The film's director, Olha Chernykh, shared her idea: "The idea for the film came about a few years ago when I was rethinking the experience of emigration and war on the example of my own family, which was forced to move from Donetsk to Kyiv in 2014. My parents left, but my grandmother and some other relatives stayed behind in the occupied city. I watched them go through changes, adapt to the new reality, spicing everything up with black humour and a touch of optimism."

We would like to remind you that IDFA is one of the largest and most prominent documentary film festivals in the world, which has been held in Amsterdam since 1988. The festival aims to promote creative documentaries for a wide audience. The festival programme includes various competition sections, such as:

"Joris Evens - for films with a running time of more than 60 minutes;"

Silver Wolf - for films of less than 60 minutes in length;

"Silver Wolf Cub - for films up to 30 minutes;

"First Appearance - a competition for debuts.

The festival also presents other awards such as the Audience Award, Best Dutch Film, Student Film and other special competitions.