VUFKU (All-Ukrainian Photo Cinema Administration) existed for less than nine years (1922-1930), but it managed to release over 140 fiction films, several hundreds of non-fiction films and newsreels, dozens of animations, gain fame of “Ukrainian Hollywood,” and take under its control all aspects of the cinematic process – filmmaking, distribution, film press, propaganda, and education. From over 140 full-length fiction films made by VUFKU, about 60 films are considered lost. A lot of the surviving films have come down to us incomplete (without one or more parts).

The website VUFKU. Lost&Found is the first online collection of Dovzhenko-Centre’s media library and is perhaps the only online resource providing comprehensive information on VUFKU.

The mission of the VUFKU. Lost&Found project is to search and return to Ukraine the lost films of the 1920s. Traces of some of the lost films of that time can be found in international archives. Meanwhile, we are collecting archive materials about the lost films, restoring their contents, learning the context of their release.

These searches and analysis, restoration of films and their return to the cultural circulation require financial support. Donating to our fundraising campaign, which will start in October 2019, you will be able to contribute to the restoration of Ukrainian cinema.

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I Present It to You

I Present You the Knife of Ancestors

1930, First Film Studio VUFKU (Odesa), 6 parts / 1,800 m

Director:

Vasyl Radysh

Scriptwriter:

Vasyl Radysh

Cameraman:

Danylo Demutskyi, Oleksandr Lavryk

Artist:

Serhii Khudiakov, I. Padalko

Cast:

Mykola Yosypenko (Levko Ostapchuk), Hanna Meshcherska (mother), Oksana Pidlisna (Halyna, commander of an insurgent detachment), Vasyl Krasenko (Osadchyi, a miner-partisan), I. Syzov, Heorhii Astafiev, Stepan Shahaida

Levko Ostapchuk is a machine gunner in a partisan detachment headed by the woman Halyna. Levko’s father sent his son to the partisan detachment and gave him their family relic – the knife of their ancestors. During the first battle, seeing people wearing Petliura’s Ukrainian uniform, Levko cries “Friends! Friends!” and stops shooting the machine gun. Petliura’s followers break the front. Levko cannot stand the barbed wit and switches sides. Levko’s father joins the partisan detachment instead of his son. And when Levko is taken captive, his father decides his fate himself.

The film is lost.