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Oscar-winning Mstyslav Chernov expressed scepticism that Putin would accept peace terms as Trump’s support wavered for Ukraine
Bryony GoochSaturday 29 November 2025 07:03 GMTComments
Close20 Days in Mariupol director gives moving speech as he wins Oscar
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Soldiers fighting on Ukraine’s frontline see no change on the battlefield while peace talks continue back and forth between Kyiv, the Kremlin and the US, a Ukrainian filmmaker has said.
Mstyslav Chernov, the Academy award winning director of 20 Days in Mariupol, gave The Independent an insight into morale on the frontline after the limited release of his latest documentary, 2000 Meters to Andriivka, put him straight on the battlefield with Ukraine’s armed forces.
It comes as Kyiv officials continue to negotiate peace terms after US president Donald Trump put forward a deal to end the war which critics have described as being pro-Russian.
While US officials reopened dialogue with the Kremlin in February, Mr Chernov explained that global diplomacy has meant very little to those fighting for their lives and homeland.
open image in galleryMr Chernov won the Oscar for his documentary 20 Days in Mariupol (Jeff Vespa)“All these conversations, they don't get to the front line, to be clear,” he says. “There's very little interest [in] all of the political and geopolitical conversations that are happening around the world. There's very little trust for words. None of the words that were spoken since February 2025, all the big words, none of [them] have translated into actions that actually changed something on the battlefield. So there is a lot of scepticism around it.”
He continues: “What the soldiers see is if they're right now still fighting, they're going to get killed. It's very simple. You have an enemy. We have someone who's attacking you and if you put your gun down, you're dead.”
Mr Chernov himself remains sceptical that Russian president Vladimir Putin would accept peace terms, as they see the waning support for Ukraine from the Trump administration: “I just don't see Russia, who is currently in a position that they feel that they are winning on the battlefield, agreeing to any peace terms because they feel they're winning.
open image in galleryAll eyes were on Andriivka in 2023 as Ukraine made a mission to recapture the strategic village from Russian forces (Mstyslav Chernov)“They're bigger than Ukraine, and they see that the US is not supporting Ukraine. And so, we're not supporting Ukraine enough, they feel emboldened. Because of that, they will never stop, because why would they? They are profiting from this war. And their population is profiting from this war.”
Mr Chernov’s latest documentary recorded Ukraine’s perilous attempts to recapture the strategic village of Andriivka from Russian forces in 2023, weaving together original footage and intensive army bodycam video to uncover a barren wasteland. As Trump’s latest peace deal would see Ukraine cede Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk to Russia, he reflected on Russia’s further attempt to claim more territory - and on Mariupol, where his first Oscar-winning documentary was set.
He says: “We think a lot about what is happening to occupied territories right now as Russia demands to occupy more and more cities. They demand that Ukraine should surrender Sloviansk and Kopiansk and Konstantinevka and Pokrovsk [...] In order to even start thinking about it, we should remember what happened to Mariupol’s people, what happened to Izium, what happened to Kherson, and what happened is thousands of children were taken away and re-educated and right now are being taught how to fight against Ukraine.”
open image in galleryArmy bodycam footage was used in the making of 2000 Meters to Andriivka (AP)Mr Chernov’s reflection comes as Ukraine’s government revealed just two weeks ago that Russia has forcibly mobilised over 46,000 people from the occupied territories to fight against their fellow countrymen.
“What we'll see in those occupied territories is what any colonial empire does,” he adds. “They occupy their outskirts. They enslave, they torture, they suppress people in the country they invaded and they sent them to fight for it. It's a perpetual imperialistic motion that we know was always happening for Russia.”
He issued a stark warning about what might happen if Ukraine were forced to cede further territory, echoing what happened during the illegal occupation of Bucha between 7 March and 1 April 2022 in the early stages of Russia’s full-scale invasion. Ukrainian officials reported that 458 bodies were recovered from the illegal occupation in the Kyiv Oblast, including nine children under the age of 18.
“Give away another city, there will be more of them. And there will be more tortures, there will be more forests with unnamed unmarked graves like the one in Izium of people who have been killed by occupations. There will be more Buchas. Sloviansk is a very pro-Ukrainian city. If they just get in there without a fight, if they would suddenly occupy it. We'll have Bucha again, but on a bigger scale.”
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