The world premiere of Rhino took place on September 9, 2021, at the
78th Venice Film Festival in the Orizzonti section.[3][2]
Plot
Starting out as an aggressive delinquent, a young man nicknamed “Rhino” quickly works his way up the criminal hierarchy in 1990s Ukraine. Rhino has only known power and cruelty, but with nothing left to lose, could he finally find a chance at redemption?[1]
In July 2020, Ukraine's Council for State Support of Cinematography made a decision to support the Rhino film project – funding received from the
Ukrainian State Film Agency was
₴25million, which amounted to about 50% of the film's total budget of ₴50million (€1.6million).[4] Overall the film has received ₴46million (€1.45million) in funding from governmental film institutions which represents around 92% of the overall budget of ₴50million (€1.6million); speficifcally, the
Ukrainian State Film Agency contributed 50% (₴25million / €800,000),[4] the Council of Europe's
Eurimages Fund contributed 17% (₴8.6million / €270,000),[5][6][7][8] the
Polish Film Institute contributed 15% (₴7.5million / €232,600 / 1millionzł),[9][10][11][12] and the German film fund
Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg contributed 10% (₴4.8million / €150,000).[13]
Screenplay
The story centers around a gangster Rhino, who's trying to survive Ukraine's "wild 90s". In August–September 2021 in his interviews for Deadline Hollywood and The Hollywood Reporter Sentsov confessed that he decided to make a movie about Ukraine's wild crime-infested 90s because he believes that to date "[Ukraine hasn't made any] movies about the “wild” 90s". Sensov also shared that the prototype for the film's main character, Rhino, was one of Sentsov's friends.[14][15]
Filming
In 2012 film's director and writer
Oleh Sentsov presented Rhino film project at the industry platform of the
Sofia International Film Festival, where it received awards for Best Project and Best Pitching.[16][17][18] Additionally in 2012 Sentsov presented Rhino film project at the producer pitching meeting of
Odesa International Film Festival where the project won a grant of ₴25 thousand.[19] However, work on the film was suspended in 2014 due to Sentsov's illegal arrest by Russian security services and his subsequent incarceration.[18] Work on the project only resumed after Oleh Sentsov was released by Russia in September 2019 as a part of Russia-Ukraine prisoner exchange.[17]
Filming began in July 2020 and ended in December 2020 and took place in
Kryvyi Rih,
Lviv and
Kyiv.[20][21]
The film is a co-production of
Ukraine,
Poland and
Germany. The Ukrainian side of production is represented by producer Denys Ivanov's Arthouse Traffic and Oleh Sentsov's Cry Cinema. Polish partners are
Apple Film Production,[22] German – Ma.ja.de. film company. The international distributor of the film is WestEnd Films.[23]
Marketing
Promotion
On September 6, 2021, industry publication cineuropa.org released the first official international film poster.[24] A day later on September 7, 2021, industry publication Deadline released the first official international film trailer.[25][26][27][28] Fostylen magazine called the trailer impressive.[29]
Release
The world premiere of Rhino took place on September 9, 2021, at the
78th Venice Film Festival in the Orizzonti section; it was the closing film of the Orizzonti section.[30][3][2][31]