By Tamar Baumgarten-Noort. Sometimes films can be small windows to another universe. Those brief encounters with strange worlds can acquaint us with people’s entire destinies – or just show us a small fraction, a snap-shot. Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy’s film Diagnosis feels like somebody has accidentally left a window open and closes it hastily in the end. The viewer stumbles into the action almost accidentally, witnessing the getaway of a young couple, following them a little bit on their way – and then the connection is already severed and the encounter with this strange world is over.

A young girl gives birth to a child, but the birth becomes irrelevant as it turns out that she is HIV positive – and so is her child. But hers is neither a melodramatic sob story nor an emotional platform for the viewer to rest upon until they can turn to their own everyday worries with relief. The observational camera, more accompanying than staging the young couple, never takes sides. And this neutral stance is never easy, as the desperate situation of the two makes them criminal outlaws. But the neutrality strengthens the impression that DIAGNOSIS shows us only a small fragment of the story. We don’t know the past or future of the couple in this parallel universe we get a glimpse into. The story exists separately from the audience – even separately from the cinema.

This formal concept enables Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy to create a political dimension by just using the outer form of his film. Because in the Ukraine stories like these do indeed happen outside of the cinema. Youths living out on the street, getting infected with HIV and becoming pregnant – in the streets of Kiev hopelessness is rampant. The fear of public authorities, the very people that should be there to help them, drives the couple away and to their cruel deed. In this respect Slaboshpytskiy points his warning finger towards the government: Look what’s happening in your country. He opens up the window – but the universe that becomes visible behind it is no strange world but his own homeland.

Links

• DIAGNOSIS (UA 2009. Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy)
• At the Beginning There Is Always the Human Being – An interview with Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy
• Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors – Tamar Baumgarten-Noort about the Ukrainian film market