A mystical love story between a proud teacher at a Yakut school and a newly arrived director from Moscow who stands in her way.
Poet and writer Inga Shepeleva’s debut feature was selected for the competition programs at Mayak Festival of Contemporary Russian Cinema and São Paulo International Film Festival.
The ice on the Lena River cracks and begins to break up—perestroika has come. A new director (Aleksandr Koshkidko) arrives at a music school in a Yakut town from Moscow. Charged with reforming the curriculum, he insists, among other changes, that the school choir stop performing the Soviet song «The White Ship.» But choir director Marta Grigorievna (Ella Sokolova), who has rehearsed the song with children for the past twenty years, refuses. Their clash—alongside the entanglement of different cultures, languages, and eras—leads to a mystical connection between a Russian man and a Sakha woman. In the end, she must choose—remain true to herself or leap into the unknown and be transformed.
Inga Shepeleva’s debut feature is based on her novella of the same name, written at age 21 as a reflection on her childhood and youth: music school, coming of age amid the snows of the Far North, and witnessing the quest for self-determination in the Republic of Sakha. In its literary origins, the story conveys a childlike, naive, and absurd sense of reality, at times tipping into mysticism. During the adaptation and filming process, the story expanded to encompass a struggle of identities, the search for connection, and a deep bond with nature and ancestral spirits. Folk, classical, pop, and ambient music heard throughout the picture becomes an expression of the tensions between cultures.
The film will be screened in Russian and Yakut with Russian subtitles, followed by a discussion with director and screenwriter Inga Shepeleva.
The White Ship
Dir. Inga Shepeleva
Russia, France, 2024. 90 min.
18+