Spetsialna Operatsiia

When Russian troops occupied Ukraine’s Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant on February 24, 2022, in the very first hours of their all-out invasion of Ukraine, their activities were documented by CCTV cameras. They turned the territory of the nuclear power plant into a military base in an attempt to occupy the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, located just a hundred miles away. Most of their criminal activities during the five weeks they were stuck at the radioactive site were captured by the nuclear plant’s CCTV system.
Based on that footage, recorded at the site of the worst nuclear disaster in history, Spetsialna Operatsiia creates an almost disembodied examination of military logic. Each shot of this film is a piece of evidence representing a war crime of nuclear terror.

Oleksiy Radynski is a filmmaker and writer based in Kyiv. His films experiment with documentary forms and the practices of political cinema. They have been screened at film festivals and exhibitions worldwide such as International Film Festival Rotterdam, the Institute of Contemporary Arts, Taipei Biennial, Sheffield Doc Fest, DOK Leipzig. His film Chornobyl 22 (2023) won the Grand Prix at the Oberhausen International Short Film Festival.

Director Oleksiy Radynski. Screenplay Oleksiy Radynski. Editing Taras Spivak. Sound Design Vladimir Golovnitsky. Sound Vladimir Golovnitsky. Co-Producers Lyuba Knorozok, Jurga Dikciuvene-Kaye.

Films: 2013: Incident in the Museum (8 min). 2014: Integration (17 min). 2015: People Who Came to Power (with Tomas Rafa, 17 min). 2016: Landslide (28 min). 2017: The Film of Kyiv. Episode One (8 min). 2019: Facade Colour: Blue (23 min). 2020: Сirculation (11 min). 2022: Infinity According to Florian (70 min). 2023: Chornobyl 22 (22 min). 2024: Where Russia Ends (25 min). 2025: Spetsialna Operatsiia / Special Operation.