Its world premiere took place on 6 September 2021[1] at the 78th Venice International Film Festival, where it was selected to compete for the Golden Lion.
During his time as the prisoner of war, Serhiy witnesses terrifying scenes of torture, rape and various other examples of dehumanizing behaviour towards POWs.
To help fight his post-war PTSD, Serhiy decides to try and fix his relationships with his ex-wife and his estranged 12-year-old daughter Polina, who is suffering from a recent loss of a loved one in the war.
As Serhiy spends more time with Polina and tries to help her move on from her loss, he gradually starts to confront his own post-traumatic fears and anxieties.
[8][9][10] Reflection was produced by Valentyn Vasyanovych and Iya Myslyts'ka (Harmata Films/Arsenal Films) as well as Volodymyr Yatsenko and Anna Sobolevska (Limelite/ForeFilms).
[13][14][15] However, to ensure a realistic depiction of the Russo-Ukrainian War, Vasyanovych heavily relied on military consultants, who have gone through Russo-Ukrainian War; one of the better known of the film's consultants was Stanislav Aseyev, who himself spent more than two years as political prisoner in the Donetsk People's Republic's notorious Izolyatsia prison in 2017–2019.
Kiang emphasized the fact that it is the "tension between the startling and sometimes brutally visceral story each single scene contains and the coolly considered, contemplative manner of its containment — lit in perfectly centered shafts of painterly, Caravaggian light — that makes “Reflection” such a compelling statement on the horrors of armed conflict, specifically here [in] the early days of the still-ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War" and concluded by saying that "[Reflection] is oblique, challenging and, if you're up for it, one of the most intellectually provocative and rewarding films in this year's Venice Competition".
[38] Anna Smith, writing for Deadline, praised Vasyanovych's new work calling it a "thought-provoking film" where "writer-director-cinematographer Vasyanovych presents events in a quiet, matter of fact way, both mimicking the cold detachment of the aggressors and underlining the fact that these [war] terrors do not require sensationalizing".