27 May 2026 – Aaron MacCarley, an award-winning American film director, releases a short 8-minute film about his trip with Sunflower Scotland in April 2026. It shows the day-to-day work of the charity in Ukraine. The main message of the film is that Sunflower Scotland’s work only starts when they cross the border with Ukraine.
The video captures aid distribution to disabled children, a delivery of medical aid to hospital. Finally, it shows how vehicles which were used to bring humanitarian supplies from Scotland, are donated to Ukrainian defenders.
Film director Aaron MacCarley
Filmmaker Aaron MacCarley received the Best Director for a Feature Film award at the North Hollywood Cinefest and the Best Feature-Length Documentary award at the Arpa International Film Festival for his debut documentary Sunflowers in the Rain. [Source: AFFMA]
He was recognized with these awards for his work producing and directing the film, which was shot in Ukraine in 2023. During that time Aaron travelled across Kharkiv, Kostyantynivka, Kramatorsk, Kherson and other parts of Ukraine, filming how various team are responding to the war and helping people and animals.
While filming various volunteers groups in 2023, Aaron met with Sunflower Scotland. In 2026, we invited him to join one of our missions as an observer.
April 2026 mission: unpolished, unscripted
The film about the April 2026 mission is a short documentary. It is unscripted, and shows the events as they unfolded. Aaron asked Oleg to comment on what they were doing: all conversations are spontaneous and unpolished.
Sunflower Scotland travelled according to its own mission plan, from one location to the next, and delivered humanitarian aid. First, they visited My Mozhemo (“We can” – Ukrainian), a grassroot group of parents of children with disabilities.
After that, the team went to Slovyansk, where they donated rowing machines and an exercise cycle to a rehabilitation centre of the 60th Brigade. After that, the first vehicle was empty, and they went to Kramatorsk to donate it to the 36th Marines.
Next, Sunflower Scotland donated lots of medical supplies from NHS Bradford and St Columba’s Hospice (Edinburgh) to Dnipro Regional Clinical Hospital (Mechnykova hospital).
There is a short scene of how we drive to a field hospital in Zaporizhzhia, where we donated sets of clothes for wounded soldiers.
The final part of the film speak about what happens in Kharkiv. All our humanitarian cargo had been delivered and donated across frontline locations, and three vehicles were finally empty. We donated them to the 113th Territorial Brigade, medics of the 2nd Battalion of Khartiya, and the drone team at Kraken GUR MOU.
How it was funded
We received a dedicated grant specifically for marketing, and used it to cover the costs of Mr MacCarley’s work. We did not use a penny of humanitarian donations which you give for Ukraine.
Thank you
We would like to thank Mr Aaron MacCarley for his courage and professionalism. The short documentary was produced at the same high level as a TV documentary.
We would like to say big thanks to all our donors, every organisation and person who contributed items and money. We are able to help people in Ukraine only thanks to you.
Sincere thanks to Ukrainian volunteers who helped us to travel across Ukraine and deliver humanitarian aid: Olena Romanenko and Petro-Pavlo Kopersako.
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