Issue 88 (2025) |
Renata Dzhalo: On This Land (Na etoi zemle, 2024) reviewed by Birgit Beumers © 2025 |
Renata Dzhalo (b. 1997) is a St. Petersburg-born actress and filmmaker, who studied at VGIK, graduating in 2021 from Aleksei Uchitel'’s experimental workshop. Dzhalo’s debut fiction film, which premiered at Mayak FF in Gelendzhik in October 2024, went on to compete in Rotterdam IFF in January 2025.
Set in the late 18th century, this black-and-white film makes for captivating viewing, while its narrative remains loose and sketchy. The action unfolds in a small settlement, held together by folk beliefs, superstitions, and Orthodox traditions, reflecting well the coexistence of orthodoxy and paganism since Christianization.
Dzhalo does not seek to create a concise and accurate historical setting; rather, her film explores the state of mind of the villagers, who live in seclusion from the outside world and in dependence from the rich landowners: “For me, the film does not research a historical reality, but turns to memory, which takes the form of a different time. It is the memory in which lives the fear of touch, the desire for dissolution, for flight—an almost child-like impression, too fragile to speak about directly” (ProfiCinema 2025). She uses the past to explain fear and curiosity and trace its role in the human psyche. And she proceeds in four parts, observing two movements in the story of twin sisters, and in the story of a man who is “other” in his desire to fly—to see the world from above, to search for advancement, and to escape.
The film begins with a portrayal of the tightly knit village community: children and adults are busy in the fields, women work at the home, and a mass is being sung. The crane shots offer a perspective from an elevation, from above. This connects cinematically to the theme of the balloon flight, and historically to the age-old myth of human flight, and to Icarus. The camera’s eye wanders from field to field, the crowd assembles as the strange “Icarus” stands on a roof while people appeal for him to step down: a contrast is created between the community and the outsider, the man who wants to be different, who tries to escape from the world of tradition, and who wishes to see the world from above (as we, the viewers, do).
Part I sets up one of the key themes: the twin girls are cuddling, bent over one another, crying and laughing, huddled together, even though they should not touch each other. One girl has blisters on her legs: she is ill; the other twin is blamed for the sickness, and she will be driven away. Superstition governs everyday life. Inside the house, the old women of the village are busy with embroidery and spinning; they accuse the healthy sister of eating up the sick one, sucking away her vitality. While the old women gossip, about the girls and about the stranger who seeks to fly, someone burns the latter’s wings: the people fear being different, they are afraid of trying, experimenting, seeking out a different way of life. Meanwhile, the girls comfort each other; their togetherness is filmed through the cowshed. The mother pulls them apart and takes one girl away: the girl claims “it’s not me” (eto ne ia)—what happens is not her doing, but also: this is not my identity, I am “other.” With a camera that refrains from overview and focuses narrowly on the characters, Dzhalo creates a sense of confusion, which reflects the state of the characters, unable to see the greater picture. This first part introduces the peasant community, governed by fear of the unknown; “Icarus” is marginalized, but the story of focused on the twin’s disease.
In Part II, a matchmaker arrives to give away the “evil” girl who has been “eating away” her sister. Meanwhile, “Icarus” jumps down an abyss near the embankment and falls; he tries again, while the girl watches, realizing that such an escape would also allow her to get away. The two themes are connected, but an escape remains yet beyond reach. A jester arrives with his cart, followed by a well-dressed woman and two boys, proposing a puppet theater performance, but the players argue and the woman wanders off. The preparations for marrying the evil girl progress, while she continues her observation of “Icarus.” A fire burns in the fields, the harvest is destroyed, the jester is sent away: the village is doomed and cannot rid itself of misfortunes. This segment shows the devastating effect of superstitions, as the villagers seek to lay the blame for sickness and draught on individuals.
Part III introduces another social class: feudal lords and landowners. They are dressed elegantly and travel in a carriage, but the first observation is of one lord standing by a tree and urinating, while the other waits in the carriage. The men find the dead body of a woman, which they need to make disappear; they verify the harvest and the loss of crops due to draught: the soil is not fertile, there has not been enough rain. They ride past huts and houses that the camera captures through the open carriage window. He men talk to the villagers, who blame “Icarus” for their misfortune. The segment introduces a third layer of ignorance: the lords who observe misfortunes for entertainment, and who assume no responsibility. Instead, they take “Icarus” to build another set of wings and prove he can fly—and he will be freed. As in the third act of a drama, the potential conflict is introduced through class difference, but it is not played out.
Instead, in Part IV, both the lines of the twins and “Icarus” is connected and resolved. The superstition of the villagers leads to the wedding ritual of the girl: the bride is being dressed; the groom, shy and immature, gets changed; they lay on a bed made of hay to consummate their marriage, but he does not know what to do. Meanwhile, “Icarus” prepares for the flight. At the gentlemen’s house, dinner is being set. “Icarus” climbs the mansion’s roof, ready to jump and fly across the garden. While the men make bets, they stop him from jumping; instead, he is brought down and scrutinized as an object of curiosity. One of the gentlemen takes him away, and fires with his shotgun into the air. The man falls to the ground from fear. During an evening dance, the gentleman finds the wings, tries them on and ditches them: they are useless. Knowledge, aspiration and hope will never work, and not bring about any change—neither to the peasants nor the gentry. In a parallel sequence, an old woman brings the sister back to the twin after the sick girl’s death. The dance at the mansion highlights the value of progress only for entertainment, while the inventor perishes from fear; the attempt to get rid of the evil sister proves that superstition offers no salvation either. In the end, the girl is alone in the forest; she can also build wings, large ones. And then we hear the flapping of the wings—and a crash.
Man’s desire to escape is doomed: across the four parts, one of the twins is held responsible for the other: the punishment shows no effect, the sister still dies. The birdman’s attempt to escape also fails, again and again, but his death is brought about by fear. Both outsiders die of fear or shock, of a sense of guilt. The film highlights what William Blake called “mind-forg’d manacles:” those self-imposed rules, expressed in superstition and obsession, that entrap the individual. The film’s language is a repetitive sing-song without much meaning: language does not serve communication. Meanwhile, the gentry is may be rich and powerful, but bored: they merely seek entertainment. The simple folk will die of fear. Such is the predicament of modern society: those who can bring about change do not act. And with this, Dzhalo makes a most topical statement:
The historical reality that Renata Dzhalo constructs has an abstract texture, born from the wish to make a film about how man makes a flying machine. In the end, the theme of the first peasant flight became a thread in the scraps of history and the out-of-time portrayal of a Russian village, which cannot overcome otherness, and under the reign of landlords exists on the crossing of folk beliefs and orthodox rituals. On the level of sensations, the film is filled with fear of an impending disaster and a wish for liberation: both the peasants and the landlords dream about flights. This is a cinematic essay about the possibility of humanity in conditions not made for humanity. (Korrespondent 2025).
Birgit Beumers
Bristol, UK
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Works Cited
Korrespondent. 2025. “Fil’m ‘Na etoi zemle’ pro to, kak chelovek stremitsia k transgressii.” Interview with Renata Dhzalo. ProfiCinema 11 February.
ProfiCinema. 2025a. “‘Na etoi zemle’ Renaty Dzhalo vyidet v prokat 24 aprelia.” ProfiCinema 31 March.
On This Land, Russia, 2024
Black-and-white, 98 minutes
Director: Renata Dzhalo
Screenplay: Renata Dzhalo, Elizaveta Meledina
Cinematography: Ekaterina Smolina
Editing: Sof’ia Meledina
Music: Robert Ziganshin
Cast: Viktoria Sniatkova, Marina Sniatkova, Aleksandr Aleksandrov, Aleksandr Koruchekov, Sergei Kirpechenok, Oleg Riazantsev, Raul Davliatov
Producer: Aleksei Uchitel’, Kira Saksaganskaya
Production Company: Rock Films Studio
Renata Dzhalo: On This Land (Na etoi zemle, 2024) reviewed by Birgit Beumers © 2025 |