Stork of Hope Film Review

Directed by: Alexander Franskevich-Leie

Written by: Marina Cheblakova, Alexander Franskevich-Leie, Denis Nupreichik

Starring: Aleksandr Abramovich, Yosef Ash, Sergey Belyakovich

Film Review by: Holly Baker

⭐️⭐️

Stork of Hope (2026) follows the lives of two brothers who are orphaned during the Nazi occupation of Europe. Directed by Alexander Franskevich-Leie, the story is told retrospectively by Ilya, now an old man with a family of his own. He narrates the perils he and his brother endured during the Nazi occupation, highlighting the fact that he and his brother were forcibly separated.

Many viewers may find a film with a central topic of the Holocaust leading with the theme of hope to be fundamentally wrong. This is because the Holocaust itself, as recitals tell us, lacked any form of hope for those who were victims of it. Just as Schindler’s List (1993) was criticised for having an optimistic message through using the drama of The Second World War's events as well as heartfelt characters based on real events, Stork of Hope uses a true story to shift the tone of real events into something unidentifiable compared to what actually occurred. There is no filmic method of capturing the events of the Holocaust; there is nothing redeemably hopeful about what happened in the Nazi concentration camps, as well as outside of these camps. These are things which are abysmal beyond words.

The film suffers, as do many more recent films set during the war periods – such as The Choral – from a nonsensical look of cleanliness. Though the characters are suffering through one of the worst occurrences in history, they mostly appear in freshly ironed clothes, and the film has a look of sleekness which bypasses the grim reality of the era.

Besides some overarching issues, the film has some excellent presentations of hopelessness with several hard-hitting moments involving senseless violence. In a harrowing scene where Jewish residents are rounded up out of their own homes, their fear and confusion are highlighted excellently, as is the evil and mercilessness of the Nazi soldiers who begin to take their lives. In Stork of Hope, viewers witness not only the evil mentality of the Nazis but also the brutality of the violence, as the film does not shy away from showing explicit gore and disturbing hanging sequences.

Stork of Hope Film Trailer

Clearly borrowing from Schindler's List, the film’s colour grading during the flashback sequences is extremely washed out, with red being the only identifiable colour which pops out to highlight the death of hope. Whilst this works and effectively gives the film the appearance of hopelessness and outlines the remorselessness of the Nazis, the contrast to the present-day scenes where Ilya is an old man is jarring. These moments are in full colour, as well as being incredibly well-lit. The transition between these scenes can be off-putting for viewers, as well as undermining the actual despair of the scenes set during the war.

The film’s main performances, such as that of Ilya as a young boy, are highly convincing and well-acted. The child actor does an excellent job at expressing Ilya’s suffering, enhancing the tragedy of the film’s main plot, as well as demonstrating a genuine attempt to capture the horrific realities of World War Two. When the film focuses on the present day, however, the acting is strangely nonchalant towards the story’s events. Ilya himself is reflecting as an old man, and his younger relatives listen nonexpressively as he recites his childhood to them. Viewers may find that the emotional detachment that the modern-day characters have from the actual history doesn’t quite work, especially when the scenes which take place in the past depict a huge amount of trauma on an incredibly large scale, and though time has passed, things are not necessarily any brighter now, as there are still currently disastrous war crimes taking place.

Overall, Sork of Hope’s hopeful, optimistic tone makes the film difficult to digest. Though there is certainly credit in the film’s grim presentation of true historical events, as well as several of the performances, its messaging is disoriented with its switching styles and moods as we move from past to present.

Stork of Hope is on digital 5 January from Miracle Media