“People come, people die. Non-stop.” This is the basic fact that underscores all of the various nuances in A Provincial Hospital, the new observational documentary from Ilian Metev (Sofia’s Last Ambulance), Ivan Chertov, and Zlatina Teneva. Reminiscent in certain moments of Frederick Wiseman’s institutional portraits, this is a more actively humanistic piece that details the daily goings on in the Covid ward of a hospital serving 50,000 inhabitants of western Bulgaria. Overworked and under-resourced, the tireless medical professionals are clearly the primary interest of the filmmakers, as well as the growing frustration and desperation of people struggling to pull through at the height of the pandemic.
The crux of the filmed material presents snapshots of life on the ward, both good and bad. Nurses make their morning rounds and check in with their current charges, taking temperatures, administering medicine, attempting to corral the unruly ones who don’t want to wear their oxygen masks or insist on going home. Elsewhere, patients chat together, comparing symptoms or flirting with the nurses. More difficult to watch are sequences in which the nurses need to move people – both alive and deceased – and clear out the belongings of those who haven’t made it. Scenes in the staff room offer moments of respite and levity – a cackling laugh or shared moment of gallows humour – to punctuate the onslaught of their rounds. Even at these times, though, the gravity of the situation is never far away, and a smiling face can quickly become mournful, or a perfunctory discussion about which beds are now free can pierce their necessary armour.
Sometimes the camera takes up position just outside a doorway, listening in to the conversations happening inside the room, allowing for a greater degree of privacy and – in some instances, perhaps – authenticity. In other instances the filmmakers follow at the nurses’ shoulder as they transport themselves, equipment and patients around the hospital. Even when they are directly recording a specific individual, the camera is not always compelled to move with the action, letting people wander in and out of the static frame. All of these techniques, in very different ways, create a feeling of immediacy, whether by placing the audience in close proximity or by the suggestion that they are in the room, quietly watching the dramas unfold.
The weight of what is happening can be felt more in what the patients don’t say than what they do. One man who arrives in the ward talkative and frustrated claims that by having agreed to come to the ward, he has given up; however it’s in a later scene, in which the camera crew returns to him and he is a silent and contemplative, perhaps even morose, that the impact of that belief is made manifest. One particular patient, Daniel, plays a recurring role. His journey from prone with difficulty breathing to refusing to take oxygen – and thus seriously risking his life – to on the road to rehabilitation, will melt even the hardest heart.
The fact that this is able to happen is down to unwavering perseverance of the hospital staff and their ability to muddle through despite a clear lack of funding and support. “I can’t clone myself,” someone laments, “one nurse for twelve patients.” In another sequence a nurse delivers the daily breakfast rations to the ward and worries that even though numerous patients turned down food, there was hardly enough. One of the lead doctors on the ward, Dr. Popov, turns to the camera after a patient has been ‘dropped into darkness’: “sometimes you feel like you’ve done nothing. Not nothing, but not enough.” As Daniel stands at the window, unsupported for the first time in months, with the sun on his face, it’s hard to imagine he would agree. It is in this recognition that A Provincial Hospital, despite the specificity of its setting and title, speaks to how much so many owe to so few after the last few years.
Directors, screenplay: Ilian Metev, Ivan Chertov, Zlatina Teneva
Producer: Martichka Bozhilova
Cinematography: Ivan Chertov
Editing: Ilian Metev
Sound: Ivan Andreev
Production companies: Agitprop Ltd. (Bulgaria), Sutor Kolonko (Germany), Chaconna Films (Bulgaria)
Venue: Karlovy Vary (Crystal Globe Competition)
In Bulgarian
110 minutes
