Company Profile
Tato Film is a production company that operates both in Ukraine and in Turkey created by Olena Yershova, the member of European Film Academy and Asian Pacific Screen Academy. Olena Yershova produced 10 feature films that gathered more then 100 awards worldwide and were presented on the main international festivals, including MY YOJ - Cannes competition (2010), Blind Dates (2013) - Toronto IFF, Berlinale IFF, Motherland (2015) - Venice Critics week, FROST - Director's fortnight, Cannes (2017), Falling (2017) - Karlovy Vary IFF. Beside the arthouse cinema, Tato Film is developing the historical project Turkish - French project Escape From Harem (beginning of the 20th Century) and Turkish - Italian comedy about Saint Nicolas.
Company Highlights
EVERYTHING WILL BE NOT FINE 2020
Genre: Feature Documentary
Director: Adrian Pirvu, Helena Maksyom
A remarkably frank account of an attempt to get a grip on life. The first question is “When did it all start?” With the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, perhaps? When it happened, Adrian Pirvu’s mother was nearby and pregnant with him. She believes that’s why he is almost blind in one eye. Adrian is lonely and angry, and he hopes to find purpose in his life before he turns 30. So he decides to make a film in Ukraine about other people affected by Chernobyl. That’s how he meets Helena, which turns his world upside down. A new beginning?
Helena suffers from chronic pain, but she deals with her problems differently than Adrian. They fall in love. And the film—understated and straightforward, but appealingly direct—becomes a shared project. They meet other people who are grappling with the effects of the Chernobyl disaster, and they also turn the camera on each other. The film’s main focus, besides the struggle with their physical issues, is the matter of what it is that binds them and what stands in their way. It’s about happiness, love, and uncertainty. What do you need to stay together? The search for the answer to that question transcends the personal story.
FIRPRESCI AWARD at Transilvania IFF, Best Film and Best director awards at Odessa IFF, IDFA competition (2020)
VOLCANO 2018
Genre: Dramedy
Director: Roman Bondarchuk
Screenplay: Alla Tyutyunnyk, Roman Bondarchuk, Darya Averchenko
Cast: Serhiy Stepansky, Viktor Zhdanov, Krystyna Deylyk
A series of add coincidences has left Lukas, an interpreter for an OSCE military checkpoint insperctor tour, stranded near a small southern Ukrainian steppe town. With nowhere to turn, this city boy finds shelter at the home of a colourful local named Vova. With Vova as his guide, Lukas is confronted by a universe beyond his imagination, one in which life seems utterly detached from any identificanle structure. Fascinated by his host and his host’s daughter Marushka, with whom is he rapidly falling in love, Lukas’s contempt for provincial life slowly melts away and sets him on a quest for a happiness he had never known could exist.
Karlovy Vary IFF; Golden Apricot at Yerevan IFF; Best director at Almaty IFF; The Hidden Dragon Audience Award Pingyao IFF; Best Film at Split IFF; Grand Prix at Rabatt IFF
FROST 2017
Genre: Drama
Director: Šarūnas Bartas
Screenplay: Ṧarūnas Bartas, Anna Cohen-Yanay
Cast: Vanessa Paradis, Lyja Maknaviciute, Mantas Janciauskas
Rokas and Inga, a couple of young Lithuanians, volunteer to drive a cargo van of a humanitarian aid to Ukraine. When plans change and they find themselves left to their own devices, they cross the vast snowy lands of the Donbass region in search of allies and shelter, drifting into the lives of those affected by the war. They approach the frontline in spite of the danger, all the while growing closer to each other as they begin to understand life during wartime
Director’s Fortnight - Cannes IFF 2017
Busan International Film Festival