Farewell 1983

Matyora is a village perched on a small island that will soon be swallowed by the waters of a new hydroelectric dam. The relocation has been discussed for years, but the elderly cling to their ancestral home, hoping that change will pass them by. The task of guiding the move falls to Pinegin Lev Durov, a longtime resident who carries the burden with quiet sorrow, while Vorontsov Aleksey Petrenko, the project supervisor, frames the sacrifice as a necessary step toward progress: a new dam and the towns that will rise around it.

A team arrives to dismantle the village: ancient trees are cut, abandoned homes are burned, and cemetery crosses are removed to clear the land for flooding. This deliberate destruction jolts the elders. Darya Stefaniya Stanyuta, Pavel’s mother, is especially determined to preserve her parents’ graves, a tangible link to a past that refuses to vanish. Her grandson initially helps with the relocation but soon withdraws, unsettled by the scale of loss he witnesses. As rains come earlier and the flooding timeline accelerates, families begin to burn their own homes rather than surrender them to the waters.

As the water rises, only a handful of people remain: a few elderly women, the old man Bogodul Yuri Katin-Yartsev, and a boy named Kolya Denis Luppov. On the eve of departure, Darya tenderly cleans her home, decorates it with flowers, and watches it burn—a quiet, stubborn ritual of farewell. Dawn approaches, and officials approach the mist-shrouded island, which seems to slip away in the fog, as if Matyora has already sunk.

The final shot lingers on Matyora’s ancient tree, thriving and green despite the loss of the village. The land’s enduring spirit remains, a counterpoint to the flood and to a community that refused to be erased.