Orbiting the Iron Curtain
Even dead regimes exert an irresistible gravitational pull. Several films at this year’s Festival were made in countries that once resided behind the Iron Curtain; each depicts worlds in the midst of chaotic change.
My Perestroika director Robin Hessman focuses on the generation that grew up during the Cold War but now lives in a completely different society.
Twenty years have passed since the fall of the Berlin Wall and filmmakers in the former Eastern Bloc are still orbiting the wreckage of collapsed Communism, searching for stories to extract from the rubble. Even dead regimes exert an irresistible gravitational pull.
This year's Festival includes several films made in countries that once resided behind the Iron Curtain. Diverse as they are, they each portray worlds in the midst of chaotic change – Poland of the early 80's; a dream-like, early-capitalist Estonia; and the former Soviet republic of Georgia.
The Insider spoke with the directors about their films and how they reflect the current state of Eastern Europe.
My Petrestroika
Filmmaker Robin Hessman spent nearly five years making this documentary about life in the former Soviet Union, focusing exclusively on a group of adults who were members of the same grade-school class in Moscow. Their interlocking stories provide an unusually intimate look at the hopes and disappointments of post-Communist Russia.
Hessman, who is American and has spent much of her adult life in Russia, said she wanted to focus on the generation that grew up during the Cold War but now lives in a completely different society – a Russia comprised of anarchic capitalism and mafia-dominated oligarchy.
Insider: How did you choose your subjects for the film?
Hessman: I started out broadly interviewing a lot of people of my generation and I knew I wanted to frame it with classmates in a school – you're together with the same people from grade school to graduation. I thought it would be a good frame and the subjects could contradict or complement each other. I heard that there was a guy from School 57. We met him and his family and ordered pizza and there was something wonderful about the couple. They were both teachers. The more I learned the more intrigued I was.
Insider: What surprised you the most during the making of the movie?
Hessman: There's an expression in Russia: it's the past that's unpredictable. There's a history of re-writing the past here. Stalin would insert himself in photos of Lenin. In the 90’s, there were first versions of Soviet history that people would have learned in school. All of the books that were given prizes in the early 90’s are now banned in the schools. There's censorship of TV again. The return of Soviet-like behavior has been very startling.
Insider: Is there a renewed interest in cold war history in Russia?
Hessman: Yes, I think so. There are millions of people of the younger generation who grew up not knowing that the world was divided that way. So it makes it even more important to tell stories like this. There are many films that tell about the politics and history of it, but there aren't as many films that tell about the human effects of sweeping political events and how they affect us as individuals. I think my film adds to the dialogue in that way.
All That I Love
Polish director Jacek Borcuch has fashioned a love-letter to the early 80’s with this sweet and melancholy coming-of-age tale set against the rise of punk rock music. The protagonist, a teenage boy who forms his own rock band, serves as a witness for two of his country's great political cataclysms: the death of communism and the emergence of Solidarity.
Borcuch's film takes a somewhat detached view of Poland's political maelstrom, capturing the chaos of change through they eyes of naive youth. But the personal and the political eventually come together when martial law is declared. The protagonist's subversive music suddenly becomes a liability for his friends and family.
Insider: What was your inspiration for making the film?
Borcuch: It was the music of early punk rock bands in Poland, such as Dezerter, Brygada Kryzys, WC, and the rising of the Polish punk-rock scene which happened in parallel to historical events in Poland. By historical events I mean the introduction of Martial Law in 1981. It was also happening at the same time as my coming of age. Somehow I had combined in me the memories of both.
Insider: Where did you grow up?
Borcuch: I come from a small town on the Polish seaside. That is where my perception and perspective started and it is with me until this day. It's been over 20 years now, but still, I am that boy from a small town.
Insider: The water is important in your film. Where did you shoot it?
Borcuch: We filmed on the Polish seaside – the Baltic sea – in a beautiful village called Hel. We shot between August and December 2008.
Insider: Does your movie have a political message?
Borcuch: NO.
The Temptation of St. Tony
The first Estonian film to play at the Festival, director Veiko Õunpuu's dark comedy follows the adventures of Tony, a middle manager who begins to lose his grip on sanity after firing his employees and discovering his wife's infidelity.
The film takes place at the intersection of dreams and reality, past and present, hermetic isolation and the globalized sprawl. The international cast performs in five different languages – Estonian, Russian, English, German and French.
Capitalism is the underlying sickness that infects Tony – an invisible, odorless gas that warps his mind and clouds his judgment. The film's surrealist touches alternate with deadpan comedy to create the unsettling feeling of a single mind – or perhaps an entire country – collapsing under its own weight.
Insider: How did you get the idea to make this film?
Õunpuu: The idea that got stuck in my skull was that it is almost impossible to be truly selfless in a society such as ours where all social relations are dictated by the profit-driven economy and fierce competition. Even if you wanted to be, say, a good middle manager, save people’s jobs or do whatever good people generally do, you would still have to make your decisions based on the cold hard fact that your company must survive in this hostile environment. So I took it from there and decided that we are fucked as a civilization. This is the general idea behind the film.
Insider: How do you explain the movie's dream-like ambiance?
Õunpuu: You can do as some Greeks did centuries ago and ask if the reality in which you thought the civilization was fucked even existed, or is it just some complex maze that some mad demiurge created for reasons unknown to you?
Insider: What filmmakers have inspired you?
Õunpuu: Luis Bunuel, Aki Kaurismäki, John Cassavetes, Andrei Tarkovsky.
Insider: What memories do you have of the Soviet Union?
Õunpuu: I was born in Saaremaa, an island in the Baltic Sea and I grew up in the Soviet Union. Actually I grew right out of it when the Union collapsed at the time of my graduation from high school and when Estonia regained its independency. After high school I went to study briefly at the Estonian Business School, from where I managed to drop out. After which I took up Literary Theory at the Estonian Institute of Humanities and dropped out again. And finally I studied painting at the Estonian Academy of Arts, from where I have by now most probably also dropped out. I live currently in Tallinn. More precisely, in its very picturesque old town.
Insider: How has the Estonian film industry changed over the years?
Õunpuu: What is an Estonian film industry?
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