Poignant documentary by Irish director Gar O’Rourke peers into a faded Soviet-era institution where visitors search for relief while war grinds on outside

There is something ever so slightly Martin Parr-like about this documentary, filmed inside a shabby rundown health resort near Odesa, in Ukraine. It’s not the colour palette, which is Soviet-era pale beige, but the images of holidaymakers: elderly men strutting about in thongs and playing ping pong in their vests; retirees of both sexes glad-ragged at the disco. Like Parr’s photos, the images are funny but not unkind; everyone retains their dignity. The director is Irish film-maker Gar O’Rourke, who planned Sanatorium before the war, but filmed it after Russia invaded Ukraine, which adds a layer of melancholy to the guests’ search for health and happiness.

The huge Kuyalnik sanatorium is a time warp with its brutalist architecture and institutional interiors. Back in its glory days, people must have come here in their thousands. Now, the place is a little tired: paint peeling off the walls, the ceilings stained by leaks. The health treatments too have a retro feel: mud wraps and electro massage machines. One guest is Natalia, who has brought her single 40-ish son Andriy, hoping to find him a wife. That doesn’t look promising since most of the other guests look old enough to have visited the sanatorium back in the day. Mother and son give the film a lovely moment slow dancing together to George Michael’s Careless Whisper at the disco. Other stories emerge: one woman’s husband was killed on the frontline; a younger guest is a soldier recovering from injuries sustained on the frontline. Another woman is here for help with fertility.