Movie Review: 'Russian Woodpecker'
Psychologists point out that when we experience traumatic and tragic event, which almost 
seems outside the realm of possibility we tend to make connections where none may exist. In the 2015 documentary the Russian Woodpecker we see Ukrainian artist Fedor Alexandrovich go through this process. As a boy the Chernobyl disaster left a massive emotional impact on Alexandrovich as he was torn away from his family and experienced his hometown abandoned to a nuclear disaster. Now as a man he seeks to discover the truth behind one of the biggest disasters of the twentieth century as figure out that it may be part of a larger conspiracy. As an audience we watch as the artist by trade tracks down those who worked at Chernobyl and learns that the power plant should not be the focus of his investigation, rather the massive Duga radio tower next to the infamous power plant. Costing the Soviet Union billions, the signal broadcast from Duga was known internationally as the "Russian Woodpecker" as it played a nonstop rapid tapping. Fedor Alexandrovich forms a conspiracy theory that a high ranking Soviet official caused the Chernobyl meltdown to cover up the fact that Duga was not functioning as planned.
The bizarre journey Alexandrovich goes on to discover his truth is part of a larger story, as
