– Ukrainian cinema arrived at the Czech festival with the numbers to prove it is still working — and with a clear demand for Europe to move beyond crisis response
l-r: Uldis Cekulis, Simone Baumann, Katarína Krnáčová and Ivanna Khitsinska during the panel
As part of Karlovy Vary’s industry programme, a panel on Ukrainian cinema under wartime conditions made one thing clear: the sector is still producing, but emergency solidarity is no longer enough. Held on 7 July under the title “Stories Under Fire: Ukrainian Cinema and the Need for Long-Term Support”, the discussion brought together Ukrainian moderator and producer Ivanna Khitsinska with German Films managing director Simone Baumann, Slovak producer Katarína Krnáčová and Latvian producer Uldis Cekulis to discuss how European partners can help Ukrainian cinema move from survival mode towards lasting co-production capacity.
Khitsinska opened the session with a set of figures underlining both the resilience and fragility of the industry. According to the data presented, 122 film projects are currently in production with Ukrainian State Film Agency support, while 46 projects were completed in 2025. These included 18 documentaries, 17 feature films, six fiction TV series, four documentary TV films and one animated series. Their total budget amounted to UAH 562 million (approx. €11 million), with state contributions of UAH 319 million (approx. €6.2 million). Many of these completed films, Khitsinska noted, had begun before the full-scale invasion and were finished under wartime conditions.
Support is now spread across several institutions. The State Film Agency remains central to production and completion funding, while the Ukrainian Cultural Fund’s Art on Screen 2026 scheme is backing audiovisual content, pre-production and adaptation with UAH 70 million (approx. €1.37 million). The Ukrainian Film Academy, Netflix and EAVE are also supporting projects at key stages, including 15 development grants of $15,000 (approx. €13,200) in 2026 and 20 post-production grants of the same amount in 2025.
One of the most concrete partnership models discussed was the cooperation between Suspilne Ukraine and ARTE. The broadcaster partnership has moved from a co-production pitching system to direct commissioning for selected projects, with a formal partnership agreement signed in December 2025. By June 2026, four projects were planned for commissioning, three of them already involving French co-producers. For Khitsinska, the message was that “a public broadcaster can become a structural co-production partner, not only a platform for broadcast.”
Baumann, who has been involved with the European Solidarity Fund for Ukrainian Films since its creation, stressed both the value and the limits of emergency mechanisms. “The fund is really supportive, but it cannot solve the problem. It can only accompany the production,” she said. With annual resources of roughly €1 million to €1.4 million from participating European countries, the fund has helped projects through development, post-production and production calls, but Baumann warned that this remains “a drop in the bucket” compared with the sector’s needs.
A central issue, she argued, is the lack of sustainable national support inside Ukraine, which can distort the structure of co-productions. If most of a film’s financing comes from Germany, Poland or other European partners, Ukrainian projects risk becoming formally majority-European, even when they remain Ukrainian in identity and authorship. Baumann also pointed to practical wartime barriers: disrupted cash flow, difficulty transferring money, crews scattered across Europe, and the challenge of securing permission for male actors or filmmakers to travel.
Krnáčová described Slovakia’s 2022 special support call for Ukrainian projects as a rapid and necessary response. Through it, she joined two Ukrainian co-productions: Roman Bondarchuk’s The Editorial Office, which was able to shoot its final scene in Slovakia, and a documentary project later completed after a long post-production process. Yet she noted that such one-off initiatives cannot be the only model. “It would be great if Ukraine would be able to support minority productions,” she said, arguing that reciprocity is essential to normal European co-production relations.
For Cekulis, whose work with Ukrainian filmmakers dates back to Ukrainian Sheriffs, trust and communication remain as important as financing. “Frequent communication is really the same value as money, and trust is something much more than money,” he said. He also praised Ukrainian creative talent, especially cinematographers and sound designers, and said wartime conditions had not destroyed the quality of the work.
The panel also pushed back against the idea that Ukrainian cinema should be reduced to war films. Baumann noted that among the projects she has read there are children’s films, animation, love stories and coming-of-age stories: “It’s not just about war.” Cekulis made the same point more bluntly, recalling sales agents saying they already had “one Ukrainian film”. “Ukrainian film doesn’t mean that it’s about war,” he said.
Visibility remains a major concern. Recent Ukrainian titles have travelled widely — from To Die to Live at KVIFF and Queens of Joy at Thessaloniki to Militantropos at Cannes, Timestamp in Berlinale, Porcelain War at Sundance and Oscar winner 20 Days in Mariupol. But Baumann argued that production funding must be matched by promotion and market support. “It doesn’t make sense to put only money into production. We also have to support the promotion,” she said.
Cekulis added one very practical recommendation: make it easier for male Ukrainian directors to attend festivals. “The director is the message-maker about the film,” he underscored. In other words, if Ukrainian cinema is to remain visible, it needs not only money, but access, mobility and long-term partners.
