After The Rain: Putin’s Stolen Children Come Home

November 20, 2024

​​“The facilities at OnSight are world class and they deliver a seamless post production experience but what sets them apart is their team, cutting at OnSight is like joining a post production family, everyone on staff is incredibly welcoming, collaborative and every member of staff will go above and beyond to take care of you and your film”. – Sarah McCarthy, Director

Deep in a forest by the Baltic Sea, a group of Ukrainian families come together to start the healing process with the help of golden retrievers and palomino horses at an animal therapy retreat. In the safety of the forest, the children’s memories of being illegally deported to Russia and their families’ struggles to rescue them are unravelled with the help of skilled and sensitive counsellors. The joy and humour the children discover during their time in the forest make it easy to forget that their stories are the reason the International Criminal Court recently issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin. Nearly 20,000 abducted children remain in Russian institutions. 

After The Rain: Putin’s Stolen Children Come Home is directed by Sarah McCarthy, and produced by Olha Beskhmelnytsina, George Chignell, Natalia Libet, Sasha Odynova, with Executive Producers Sheila Nevins and Maria Logan. It follows the story of Veronika Vlasova, a 14-year-old from Kharkiv, who was captured by Russian forces and taken to an orphanage by the Federal Security Service. We are then taken along on the courageous and sustained effort from her mother and the Ukrainian Child Rights Network to bring Veronika safely home. We also meet Sasha Mezhevoy, who was 5 years old when she and her siblings were illegally deported to an orphanage in Moscow where they were threatened with forcible adoption into a Russian family. The support of the Ukrainian Child Rights Network along with other volunteer networks was instrumental in Sasha’s father, Yvgeny, being able to travel to Moscow and reclaim his family. 

After The Rain had its world premiere at the 15th Anniversary Edition of DOC NYC 2024!

It was a privilege to work on Veronika and Sasha’s stories, and we completed Picture Post on the film. The grade was performed by Senior Colourist Emily Russul Saib, Online was delivered by Senior Online Editor Adam Sample, and the project was looked after by Lead Post Producer Jeff Halsey.