Kickstart Sunday – ‘The Babushkas of Chernobyl’

Every week on Film Pulse, we highlight a Kickstarter project that we think you’ll really like, and deserves some support. Not only do we implore you to contribute to these projects, but we will contribute as well. Kick your Sunday off right by helping support independent film. If you help fund any of the projects we list, send us an e-mail at feedback@filmpulse.net, and we’ll make sure to thank you on the podcast.

This week we’d like to highlight The Babushkas of Chernobyl from filmmakers Holly Morris and Anne Bogart. This very interesting documentary follows the lives of a small village of women that live within the highly radiated zone that resulted from the Chernobyl meltdown in 1986.  This was one of out top choices last week, and now with only 11 days to go in their campaign, they’re almost there with $26,145 of $27,000. Click here to donate and help them make their goal. Hit the jump for more info.

“The Babushkas of Chernobyl” is a documentary about an extraordinary group of women who live in Chernobyl’s post-nuclear disaster “Zone of Alienation” or “Dead Zone.” For more than 25 years they have survived – and even, oddly – thrived, on some of the most contaminated land on earth. Are they sick? Are they crazy? How do they protect themselves against the wild animals that have returned to prowl the forests around Chernobyl? Do they weigh the relative risks of isolation and radiation – knowing that even now the crumbling cement cover over reactor #4 could collapse at any time? How have they maintained their fiery spirit having lived through the worst atrocities of the 20th century? Soon after we stumbled across this unlikely community while filming for the PBS series Globe Trekker in 2010, we began this project. Their existence in this dystopian environment speaks volumes about today’s (and tomorrow’s) complicated nuclear realities.