The Kiev Trial

Lee Marshall from Screen International described Loznitsa's film as "an absorbing, timely work, which touches on a question that is fresh in the minds of many of his countrymen today: how best to bear witness to crimes of war, and how to separate revenge from retribution".^[3] Similarly, Susanne Gottlieb from Cineuropa noted how Loznitsa "shows how easily justice can be turned into spectacular revenge – a debate that modern-day Ukraine will have to face sooner or later as well, given the geopolitical circumstances".^[2]

Jonathan Romney from Sight and Sound compared the film to Loznitsa's 2018 similarly themed documentary The Trial: both films about "how justice works in the context of the Stalin-era legal system", "that earlier film was about the state imposition of lies; this one is about the attempt, within the same official apparatus, of revealing and establishing truth".^[4]

The Playlist's film critic Christian Gallichio wrote: "While Loznita has crafted a compelling document of historical significance, the act of watching the film is a bit scattered. The choice to use only archival footage is commendable and creates an immediacy to the experience, but the lack of any historical context [...] creates a hermetic viewing experiencing, siloing the proceedings away from any sense of a timeline of how and when these events took place".^[5]

• The Kiev Trial at IMDb