War Fever
Date:
December 15, 2022
War Fever
War Fever
by Ineke Smits
Volya Films | Netherlands
Cinephage Productions | France
Documentary
*the access to our meeting platform and director’s previous works will start from January 10, 2025
Logline
Time and again, British deminer Chris Garrett and American para-medic Courtney Pollock risk their lives in wars that aren’t their own. Despite its intrinsic horror, what makes war so addictive? Will the birth of their daughter Reed change things?
Synopsis
Chris, a tree surgeon from the Isle of Man, learned de-mining during the Karen guerrilla war against Myanmar’s military regime. Later, his comrades-in-arms called him to the Donbas. In 2015, he narrowly escaped death behind enemy lines and left traumatized. He returned after an urgent call for help in Ukraine in 2022. Back in the warzone, he built a team of international volunteers, clearing mines near front lines, removing booby traps in liberated areas, and conducting training in Kyiv and across Europe.
Courtney enlisted in the U.S. Army to fulfill her dream of becoming an F-16 pilot but was grounded by a heart defect and became a ground controller. After six pilots under her watch were killed in Afghanistan, she developed PTSD and retrained as a paramedic, believing that giving aid would help her regain control. In 2023, she traveled to Bakhmut with her superior, Pete Reed. Their NGO provided first-line aid, evacuated civilians, and delivered medicine. A month later, she met Chris. Shortly after their first “romantic night,” Pete’s ambulance was hit by a Russian missile. With Bakhmut in chaos, Courtney discovered she was pregnant. To her surprise, Chris acknowledged the child and left the warzone. For a moment, they seemed ready to start anew. But at Pete’s memorial, they vowed to continue his work. Naming their baby Reed, they founded the NGO ‘Prevail.’ By May 2024, they returned to Kyiv with Reed in a Maxi-Cosi among medical supplies, demining gear, and survival kits.
Director’s Profile
Ineke SMITS (1960, Netherlands) graduated as a photographer and video artist from the Rotterdam Art Academy in 1984. Afterwards, she obtained a master’s degree in film directing and script writing from the National Film and Television School in England. She collaborated with Dutch writer Arthur Japin on a few short fiction films; their first feature fiction, Magonia (2001), was awarded Best Film at Bogotá Film Festival and was in competition at IFFR, San Sebastian, Toronto, Karlovy Vary and many other festivals worldwide.
Smits received part of her training as a filmmaker in Poland and she lived and worked for many years in Georgia. She is heavily influenced by Eastern European Cinema and by the emphasis on the image that artists from Eastern Europe put in their work. Her second feature, De vliegenierster van Kazbek/The Aviatrix of Kazbek, was the closing film at IFFR in 2010 and it received a nomination for the European Film Awards.
Company Profile
Selected filmography:
• YOUTH (HOMECOMING) (Wang Bing, doc, 150’, 2024), Golden Lion Competition Venice Film Festival 2024
• YOUTH (HARD TIMES) (Wang Bing, doc, 227’, 2024), International Golden Competition Locarno Film Festival 2024
• YOUTH (SPRING) (Wang Bing, doc, 212’, 2023), Cannes Film Festival – Official Selection 2023
• CITY OF WIND (Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir, fic, 90’, 2023), Venice Film Festival 2023, Busan International Film Festival 2023, CinemAsia
Film Festival 2024, Winner of Orizzonti Award for Best Actor, Selected as the Mongolian entry for Best International Feature Film at the 96th Academy Awards
• ESIMDE (Aktan Arym Kubat, fic’, 90’, 2023), Tokyo International Film Festival Competition, Winner Jury Grand Prize Asia Pacific Screen Award
• TOTEM (Sander Burger, fic, 90’, 2022), Opening Film Cinekid Festival 2022, Winner Audience Award Best Film Cinekid Festival 2022, New York International Children’s Film 2023 Grand Prix Children’s Jury 2023 (Winner of 18 awards and selected for 30 festivals worldwide).
• THE MOLE AGENT (Maite Alberdi, doc, 80’ & 52’, 2020) Academy Award® Nominee Best Documentary Feature 2021, Audience Award FF San Sebastian 2020
• A LAND IMAGINED (Yeo Siew Hua, fic, 95’, 2018) Winner Golden Leopard Locarno & Golden Star El Ghouna