When Lightning Flashes Over the Sea

Day labourers smoke while looking at the Black Sea, workmen stretch out on the roof of the damaged cathedral, a boy manoeuvres us through the sunny streets and courtyards of Odesa while he dreams of a medium-size chocolate cake for his birthday and a job on a cruise ship. Yet this cheerful everyday life is tempered by a feeling of unease, for the many gaps – the holes in the historical facades, the absence of family members or the darkness caused by the power blackouts – render the omnipresence of the war far more shocking than its deceptively far-off rumblings. The memories, experiences and dreams of the astounding people that Eva Neymann shows on her extended, attentive expedition through the harbour city become a means of survival. A refugee from Abkhazia, a nomadic clergyman, a widow who takes care of street cats, a single father whose sons live on different sides of the front, a Shoah survivor and many more give us seldom insights into the reality of a place surrounded by myths, a poetic space full of resilient humanity.