The Longer You Bleed, 2024
(Digital, 65’) (post-production)
The Longer You Bleed (2024) explores the emotional fallout of displaced Ukrainians in Berlin, navigating a world of war through screens, where absurdist humour and compassion fatigue become survival tools in a reality oversaturated with trauma
“This personal documentary follows displaced Ukrainians in Berlin contending with the traumatic absurdity of watching their homeland burn, in real-time, through pixels on Instagram. Shot over a year, the camera follows the director’s partner and her friends who—far from the war but still deeply entangled in its emotional fallout—navigate their new reality amidst the daily storm of traumatic war imagery online. The documentary blends observational storytelling with experimental audiovisual sequences to map out the unsettling arc of compassion fatigue caused by the normalisation of this disturbing reality. As the characters contend with their growing detachment from the horrors of war, absurdist humour emerges as a coping mechanism; a lens the film appropriates to critique post-industrial society as a space for processing trauma. The documentary examines the alarming shift in how we as a society are engaging with images of war, and how they, in turn, are engaging with us. Through its unique blend of intimacy and abstraction, The Longer You Bleed offers a sobering meditation on the emotional costs of living in a world oversaturated with information.”
Director — Ewan Waddell
Producer — Liubov Dyvak, Ewan Waddell
DOP — Ewan Waddell
Research — Lars Holgate, Uma Chaghaghi
Editor — Ewan Waddell
Translation — Liubov Dyvak