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JULIA BLUE

JULIA BLUE

Year of release: 2020

USA/Ukraine:  86min.

SCREENINGS & AWARDS

 Sonoma International Film Festival 2019

**Winner - Best Director

Woodstock Film Festival 2018

**Winner - Best Director World Cinema 2018

Juliene Dubuque Film Festival, 2019

**Winner - Best Film

Anchorage International Film Festival 2018

**Winner - Best Feature Film

Female Eye Film Festival, Toronto 2019

**Winner - Best International Feature

OFFICIAL SELECTION & IN COMPETITION

Seattle International Film Festival 2018

Cleveland International Film Festival 2018

Phoenix International Film Festival 2018

Berkshire International Film Festival 2018

 Molodist Film Festival, Kyiv Ukraine, 2019

Glasgow Film Festival, 2019

Ayr Film Society Screening, Scotland, February 2020​

RECOGNITION

*Fulbright Scholar Award Ukraine 2014-2015

*IFP Narrative Labs 2016  2017

Award-winner deep euphoria Calvin Klein Spotlight on Women Filmmakers ‘Live the Dream’ Grant

for Emerging Female Director - 2016

*Seattle International Film Festival - WIP Forum

*Rooftop Films - Work-In-Progress 2017

*Bethel College, Kansas

Guest Lecturer and Screening, March 2019

*Ann Arbor Polish Festival, November 2022 guest filmmaker

SYNOPSIS

Julia, a bright university student, is preparing for a life abroad when an unexpected romance sparks between her and English, a damaged soldier returning from the war zone in eastern Ukraine.  

 

From metropolitan Kyiv to a remote Carpathian village, Julia and English must decide if they are ready to build a future together in a homeland that is slowly being torn apart. 

Produced by KinoRox Productions & Lailu Productions

Cinematography by Sashcko Roshchyn

Starring Polina Snisarenko & Dmytro Yaroshenko

Featuring Victoria Kopot, Daria Barihishvilli, Evhen Yaroshchuk.

Edited by Ben Kim

Music by Alex Brown Church

 

*Shot on location in Kyiv, Ukraine & the Carpathian village of Pidhorodtsi.

RENT or PURCHASE Julia Blue to stream on Amazon US & UK.

https://www.amazon.com/Julia-Blue-Polina-Snisarenko/dp/B087Z5QC8P

 

 

 

A modern feminist perspective, meanwhile, emerges in the lively Julia Blue, in which director Roxy Toporowych tells a Kyiv romance through the prism of post-revolutionary PTSD.

-The Guardian, Streaming the Best Ukrainian Films Past and Present, 2022

A beautiful allegory for the freedoms of our modern world that seem all too fleeting, Julia Blue reminds us not just of the costs of love and war, but of the sometimes painful choices freedom demands.

-Seattle International Film Festival 2018

The sophistication of her craft in every way is remarkable for her first film. Her film humanizes a world historical event by dwelling not on the movers and shakers of history, but rather on how world events invade and shape the life of of one remarkable young woman while bringing awareness to the war in Ukraine. We hope and expect we will see many more accomplished films from Best Director, Roxy Toporowych.

-Thelma Adams, Film Critic and Juror 

Woodstock Film Festival 2018

JULIA BLUE 

Cinema as Activism

In March, 2022, Julia Blue was named one of the top ten films about Ukraine by the The Guardian, prompting me activate the film as a tool to raise funds for various organizations and give direct aid to cast and crew living in Ukraine.   

 

Over $50,000 was raised and donated at screenings between March 2022 and March 2023.  Organizations which benefited from the screenings include:  Revived Soldiers Ukraine, Nova Ukraine, Ukrainian Congress Committee of America, Razom for Ukraine, Ukrainian National Women's League, University of Michigan - War Crimes Project, and most importantly, the funds were used to directly support the cast.  The village hall where we shot the wedding scene became an impromptu sewing factory, we were able to ship boots, gloves and winter wear to newly conscripted actors turned soldiers, and support the purchase of a drone for a camera operator whose creative skills were used to track and map the atrocities in Mykolaiv.  We helped our lead actress rescue a shelter of animals destroyed by shelling, and a team of women who gathered in a basement in Kyiv to bake bread and hand deliver it to elderly people at home. A pdf document is available to learn more about these actions.

The film also became part of the Ukrainian Embassy Kyiv's cultural awareness program and has been translated into Spanish to be shown in countries across Central and South America.  Julia Blue continues to screen for universities throughout the United States and is available for distribution.  

 

For screening information please contact: kinoroxprod@gmail.com

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