Anatoliy Belov

The Girl and the Boy play in a garden. They are left alone there, and they do not have any obligations to behave in a certain way. This gives them the freedom to create their own ways of interaction with the world. During such an interaction, adult social constructs intertwine into weird children’s folklore and shift into an abstract sphere. There are secrets and various modes of being in the world of the Girl and the Boy.

Tolik, an openly gay bohemian singer/artist in the Ukrainian underground scene, is raising his niece Katya, a stubborn little girl who has taken to calling him Dad. Her mother, Anya, is both at the heart of the film and almost doomed to the fringes, adrift between solitude and stays in a psychiatric hospital.

The film is a story of love, but also the consequences of revealing cultural and social prejudices. The main protagonist tries to show to a couple of observers the variety of interpersonal relationships. Their attitude, to start with – mocking, gradually becomes reflective. The title of the work alludes to Ian Dury’s cult song Sex&Drugs & Rock&Roll. The artist draws attention to the different possible meanings of the word ‘drugs’– a means of intoxication but also a curative treatment.