Kateryna Gornostai

Directing

Kateryna Gornostai

Born 1989-03-15 · Lutsk, USSR (Ukraine)

Kateryna Gornostai (born March 15, 1989) is a Ukrainian film director, screenwriter and film editor. She is a jury member of the film festival Wiz-Art since 2014 and a member of the Ukrainian Film Academy since 2017. Kateryna Gornostai was born in Lutsk, Volyn Oblast on March 15, 1989. She was the only child of psychotherapists Svetlana Vaskivska and Pavel Gornostay. First, Kateryna studied biology (2010) and later Journalism (2012, MD) at the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy. Having graduated from the Marina Razbezhkina and Mikhail Ugarov's Documentary Film and Theatre in Moscow from October 2012 to November 2013, she returned home to Kyiv. Kateryna Gornostai started her career as a documentary filmmaker in 2012. She is currently working on educational documentaries as well as her own documentary and fiction film projects. Kateryna also teaches documentary filmmaking at Kyiv-Mohyla Academy's School of Journalism. She began to experiment with fiction films and hybrid forms. Her aesthetic and ability to convey life without artificiality have caught the attention of film critics.

Acting credits

Behind the camera

Crocodile poster
8.5

Crocodile is a game for a big company. The host shows a word only with the gestures. The one, who guesses it, chooses the next one to lead the game. Anya comes up with a difficult word for Lisa. This New Year Eve turns into a test of their friendship.

Crocodile

2018

Crocodile poster
8.5

Crocodile is a game for a big company. The host shows a word only with the gestures. The one, who guesses it, chooses the next one to lead the game. Anya comes up with a difficult word for Lisa. This New Year Eve turns into a test of their friendship.

Crocodile

2018

Condensed poster
NR

Explosion of the condensed milk on the kitchen stove - seems to be the worst thing that can happen. Even those who are responsible for its consequences don't know what will be next. A small crash in a small apartment can be an occasion for something more.

Condensed

2016

Condensed poster
NR

Explosion of the condensed milk on the kitchen stove - seems to be the worst thing that can happen. Even those who are responsible for its consequences don't know what will be next. A small crash in a small apartment can be an occasion for something more.

Condensed

2016

Stop-Zemlia poster
6.2

Hanging out with friends, smoking a lot, spinning bottles and kissing, making mistakes, playing, refusing to accept, dreaming with open eyes - life as a teenager can be overwhelmingly beautiful and difficult at the same time. In her debut, the Ukrainian director composes a deeply emotional and multi-layered portrait of a generation whilst seamlessly flowing between the fictional and the documental.

Stop-Zemlia

2022

Stop-Zemlia poster
6.2

Hanging out with friends, smoking a lot, spinning bottles and kissing, making mistakes, playing, refusing to accept, dreaming with open eyes - life as a teenager can be overwhelmingly beautiful and difficult at the same time. In her debut, the Ukrainian director composes a deeply emotional and multi-layered portrait of a generation whilst seamlessly flowing between the fictional and the documental.

Stop-Zemlia

2022

Lilac poster
NR

May. Lilac blossom in Kyiv. Five friends and alcohol from the nearest supermarket. You need to be brave to face your fears, but you need to be even more courageous to tell about them to your closest. Looking for lilac's cinquefoil to eat for good luck.

Lilac

2017

Lilac poster
NR

May. Lilac blossom in Kyiv. Five friends and alcohol from the nearest supermarket. You need to be brave to face your fears, but you need to be even more courageous to tell about them to your closest. Looking for lilac's cinquefoil to eat for good luck.

Lilac

2017

Timestamp poster
7.0

Despite the war, school life continues in Ukraine, with pupils and teachers striving to continue learning even under constant threat. The film is a mosaic of the everyday lives of teachers and students from different corners of Ukraine.

Timestamp

2025

Timestamp poster
7.0

Despite the war, school life continues in Ukraine, with pupils and teachers striving to continue learning even under constant threat. The film is a mosaic of the everyday lives of teachers and students from different corners of Ukraine.

Timestamp

2025

SOLO poster
NR

The Vilnius Palace of Marriage, opened in 1974, is highly reminiscent of Soviet-era modernist architecture in Ukraine. Mariia’s dance represents her emerging womanhood in a space traditionally meant for the initiation ritual of two people. An episode of the anthology project “Dance + City”, which bridges contemporary dance and architecture across Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, France, and Ukraine. The film was screened both as an episode within the anthology and through independent festival and award distribution.

SOLO

2024

Antonivka poster
NR

Young couple Aurora and Darko move to live in her grandpa’s house in the post-war de-occupied village. They are taking care of an 88-year-old man, who’s blind. Aurora begins to be tormented by the fear of death. Gradually, it becomes the central theme of their lives and puts everything in its place.

Antonivka

Antonivka poster
NR

Young couple Aurora and Darko move to live in her grandpa’s house in the post-war de-occupied village. They are taking care of an 88-year-old man, who’s blind. Aurora begins to be tormented by the fear of death. Gradually, it becomes the central theme of their lives and puts everything in its place.

Antonivka

Away poster
NR

"We will be together until death will tear us apart" - it is the answer to the question "till when?". But when the romance is over, it is time to decide "how to continue". Young couple is looking for the answer.

Away

2015

Away poster
NR

"We will be together until death will tear us apart" - it is the answer to the question "till when?". But when the romance is over, it is time to decide "how to continue". Young couple is looking for the answer.

Away

2015

Leopolis Night poster
NR

Polia, Solomiіa, Mariіa play in the local theater. After the spectacle, they meet a guy and walk through the night city together. Polia seems to fall in love with him. In the morning he will leave the city and they will not see each other again.

Leopolis Night

2021

Euromaidan. Rough Cut poster
7.0

Three months of revolution. From indignant protest to national unity. From pots on their heads to batons and body armor. From the euphoria of victory to the mourning of the fallen Heavenly Hundred. Revolution as an explosion of revived dignity, as the euphoria of freedom, as the pain of awareness at the cost, as the birth of the modern history of Ukraine. This year we have decided not to have an opening film, because all our attention is focused on the changes taking place in our country today. We have asked the directors who filmed the Ukrainian protests to share their best shots with us. The episodes of these upcoming films about the Euromaidan were formed in a kaleidoscope of revolution, which needs no comment. We offer you a chronicle of the Ukrainian protest. Experience the three months of fighting with us, feel and see the revolution through our eyes.

Euromaidan. Rough Cut

2014

No artwork available
NR

No synopsis available yet.

Light Sensitivity

Maidan Is Everywhere poster
NR

The story of the previous year, that for me began when Maidan had started and maybe didn't end yet. The whole year we have lived in the atmosphere of revolution, then war. Whatever you did - you saw these things in the background, you always mean them, although you live not even on a border of war, but deep in in the rear. I want to remember this year, I want to keep the memory of all the people who surrounded me. The year of Maidan, the year marked by war and peace.

Maidan Is Everywhere

2015

Between Us poster
NR

We remember dates and facts, while losing tiny details – like a bouquet of summer wildflowers, tears from onions, winter cold on a bus stop bench. We remember the birthdays of our beloved and how they like their tea, but we forget unexpected touches, floating glances, casual chats. And sometimes – when we are rapidly torn apart from each other – we engrave such moments into our memory.

Between Us

2013

Between Us poster
NR

We remember dates and facts, while losing tiny details – like a bouquet of summer wildflowers, tears from onions, winter cold on a bus stop bench. We remember the birthdays of our beloved and how they like their tea, but we forget unexpected touches, floating glances, casual chats. And sometimes – when we are rapidly torn apart from each other – we engrave such moments into our memory.

Between Us

2013