Deep Home Front (2026)

Deep Home Front explores the forgotten reality of the Kama region during the Great Patriotic War, far from the battlefront but never truly removed from the conflict. There, civilians pushed themselves to the edge of endurance, cared for children, grieved for lost loved ones, and held fast to the belief that their labor was a second front in its own right. The documentary turns its lens on daily life in the wartime home front, where sacrifice often came at the cost of health and where some people were forced to live in circus arenas and orchestra pits. Teenage girls worked as blasters in potash mines, laboratory assistants tested a typhus vaccine through methods that are hard to imagine today, and more than 2,000 housewives became record-breaking coal miners. These are just a handful of the extraordinary stories the filmmakers bring to light. The screenplay draws on extensive research in state archives, departmental and municipal museums, and libraries, while the production team also recorded dozens of interviews. The film features more than 100 documented eyewitness accounts from the wartime years.