In his new feature documentary, Iron Butterflies, Ukrainian filmmaker Roman Liubyi revisits the shocking tragedy of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, which was shot down by Russian-controlled forces over eastern Ukraine in 2014, killing all 298 people on board.
Liubyi presents the truth of what happened to MH17 and the responses from Russia and the international community, and also places the tragic events in context of Russia’s ongoing war against Ukraine. The film offers commentary on the lack of global action against Russia and shows how the events and aftermath of MH17 contained kernels of premonition.
A powerful and creative feature, Iron Butterflies’ artistic approach, effective editing, and use of a wide variety of visual materials makes it fresh and engaging, informative and emotional. Instead of relying heavily on interviews or narration, the documentary presents a mix of archival footage and news reports, social media images and videos, animation, and sequences of interpretive artistic performances.
Liubyi’s energetic style, particularly in regards his editing, is fast paced but thoughtfully crafted. It has the potential to teeter over into disjointed and frenetic as it jumps between segments and media forms, but instead the documentary always manages to maintain an effective flow and stay sharp as it propels viewers along. It packs in a ton of information but breaks it up with artistic interludes and pieces everything together in a way we can keep up with it all.
One of the film’s compelling main techniques is juxtaposition as it places the West’s news reports and investigative findings next to those of Russia. The contrast is massive. The Western-led Joint Investigation Team (JIT) lays out evidence including footage, sample analysis and reconstructions that conclude the plane was struck down by a specific surface-to-air missile belonging to the Russian army; in response, Russia presents their own reconstruction and “debunks” the JIT footage as fake. Russia’s state-owned news stations also contradict themselves, first reporting a Russian victory in taking down an enemy militia plane, then shifting to blame Ukraine defence forces once it became evident the aircraft was in fact a civilian plane. Russian news segments are shown throughout the film continuing to introduce more conflicting theories.
Exposing viewers to Russian state-owned news, we see how their propaganda works to garner support from within. The film uses other media to demonstrate this as well, including social media images and videos, and a recorded Russian missile instruction manual.
Black-and-white sequences featuring interpretive choreographed performances also artistically highlight the aftermath of the MH17 strike as well as its emotional and political impacts.
Iron Butterflies, named for the shape of the missile shrapnel that ripped through the plane, also touches on the lives lost and impact felt beyond Ukraine — particularly, the AIDS activists and scientists who were on the plane on their way to a major conference in Melbourne, Australia. The whole international AIDS community was devastated by the loss of their friends and colleagues as well as the breadth of important knowledge they carried with them.
Liubyi emphasizes how Russia has been targeting Ukraine for many years, long before the 2022 invasion. He reminds us of the annexation of Crimea and the armed conflict in the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine. Feelings of frustration come through in the film as the Ukrainian community hoped that the shocking tragedy of MH17 would spark a large global response to curb Russia’s aggressive actions, and how that failed to effectively happen.
In a chillingly-relevant interview from several years ago, a family member of one of the victims comments that in order to implement real change, Europe must sever economic ties to Russia and stop buying gas from them. In this way, the film demonstrates how the events of MH17 and lack of effective political consequences for Russia contained the kernels that led to Russia’s current escalated invasion of Ukraine.
Iron Butterflies had its international premiere at this year’s Sundance Film Festival as part of the World Cinema Documentary Competition.
© 2020-2023. UniversalCinema Mag.