The Mail

The morning begins when the mail is delivered - this has been a tradition for almost an eternity. This film looks at daily things, daily movements, daily life and the daily routines of the postman, which are nevertheless meaningful to those who await and receive newspapers and letters.

The Shoe

The late 1950s. Every night, Soviet tractors comb the coast of Latvia looking for signs of anyone who could have infiltrated the Soviet border from the sea. One morning, three Soviet patrolmen discover a woman’s shoe in the sand and footsteps leading to the quaint little village of Liepaja.

Bus

This documentary follows a bustrip from Tallinn to Kaliningrad. A route that was so common in the Soviet times now passes through 4 different countries and crosses 3 different borders.

Dawn

Based on a Soviet propaganda story about Young Pioneer (the Soviet equivalent of a Boy Scout) Morozov, who denounced his father to Stalin’s secret police and was in turn killed by his family. His life exemplified the duty of all good Soviet citizens to become informers, at any expense. In our film, 75 years later, we call him little Janis. He is a Pioneer who lives on the Soviet collective farm “Dawn”. His father is an enemy of the farm (and the Soviet system) and plots against it. Little Janis betrays his father; his father takes revenge up...

Wake Up!

The world seen through the eyes of children. The action takes place in Karosta, the former military port of Liepaja city – however, it is not that important, as the film could take place anywhere. We observe children playing on the beach, revealing the core of Pakalnina’s work: perceiving and transmitting emotions.

Dream Land

There are places that we don’t want to know anything about, places that we would rather pretend don’t exist at all. One such place is a dumpsite. From the humans’ point of view, it is a ghastly place, a stinking desert of trash. But it’s a desert that is teaming with life.

On Rubik's Road

Rubiks’ Road is a bicycle path built in the 1980s and named after Alfreds Rubiks, leader of the Latvian Communist party at the time. One of the most ferocious opposers to Latvia’s independence in the early 1990s and later elected to the European Parliament.

Theodore

Every day, come rain or shine, Theodore used to bike the seven kilometres from his house to the centre of the village to sit and drink beer in the bus stop. For him, no doubt, this place was the centre of the Universe. With his death, the centre has moved elsewhere, and the bus stop is just a bus stop again.

In the Mirror

A CrossFit trainer becomes the father of a baby girl, Snow White. Snow White’s mother dies, and her father marries a young woman obsessed with CrossFit and herself. She works out all the time in order to be the best. And she really is the best – she can do 50 burpees. In the meantime, little Snow White plays and grows up in the CrossFit gym. Time passes, and one day it turns out – while the Stepmother can do 50 burpees, Snow White can already do 53 burpees...

The Python

An absurdist farce centering around a school in post-Soviet Latvia. After a rather disgusting prank (someone defecates in the school attic), the tyrannical headmistress deems that no one can leave until the culprit is caught. When the photographer's pet python escapes, havok breaks loose.

Hello, Horse!

A film about everything changing while remaining the same. Or rather – everything remaining the same while changing. We observed this (and wanted to share) while standing (standing regularly and for a long time) on a road rather close to the Eastern border of Latvia, because we followed the suggestion of the locals who asked to shoot “that horrible road”.