Tribeca ’25: Dog of God

He calls himself a werewolf, but he is really more of a holy fool and an immortal wanderer. However, as a portent of trouble, he is even more ominous than a plague of locusts. Frankly, things have been bad in the village of Zaube since forever. It has been mismanaged by both Church, represented by Priest Buckholz, and the state, in the person of inattentive Baron Klodt. Frankly, only tavern keeper and natural healer Neze reliably delivers services to villagers, but she stands accused of witchcraft in Lauris & Raitis Abele’s animated feature Dog of God, which premiered at the 2025 Tribeca Film Festival.

Life is hard for Kilbis, thanks to his physical body and the cruelty of his master, Buckholz. At least, the pervy priest periodically orders Kilbis to flog him, but the poor altar boy understands it is just to reinforce his hatred. Nevertheless, the priest has plenty lusty peeping to atone for. Instead, he blames Neze for supposedly supplying the temptation. Hence, his accusations of witchcraft.

However, the Dog of God rather unsettles everyone when he crashes Neze’s trial. Nobody really knows what to make of him, but his spooky talk is definitely bad for business, so he winds up in the stocks next to her. Of course, you cannot keep a supernatural drifter tied down for long.

These are heady days for Latvian animation. Unfortunately for fans of the medium, Dog of God has none of the charm of the Oscar-winning Flow. Indeed, all the cruelty and scatological gross-outs have a bludgeoning effect on the audience. Frankly, when it finally ends, you might need an aspirin and warm shower—and maybe even your security blanket.

EU Showcase ’23: My Freedom

Ita Kozakevica did something revolutionary in Latvia. She ran for office. It was not just her. Kozakevica was part of the first class of Popular Front candidates, whom challenged Communist incumbents, without having the election rigged against them. She emerged as a popular leader of the democracy movement, but her personal relationships were complicated. The intersection of her public and private lives is the focus of Ilza Kunga-Melgaile’s My Freedom, which screens during AFI’s 2023 European Union Film Showcase.

Latvia is not independent yet, but Latvians are starting to believe it might be possible. Glasnost and Perestroika have spiraled out of Gorbachev’s control. In hopes of appeasing the Baltic nations, genuine democratic legislative elections have been allowed and Alicija (as the Kozakevica character is called throughout the film) has been chosen as one of the Popular Front’s best hopes for the Supreme Council.

Here is where things get a little awkward. Her de facto campaign manager will be Normunds, a failed poet, who has long carried a torch for her. They will be on the road together for extended periods of time, right when she receives anonymous notes regarding her husband, Ilgvars. He was always more accepting of the status quo than she was, but it turns out he was also an informer, having betrayed their friend Kurts, a highly respected dissident writer.

That is a lot for Alicija to process, but she still has a campaign to run. Of course, the incumbent Communists still try to build in institutional advantages in their favor, but Alicija and Normunds develop a knack for reaching people despite their obstacles.

My Freedom captures a rarely dramatized period of history—the end game of the revolution against Soviet occupation. It also captures the beginning of the flood of post-Soviet revelations regarding who informed on whom. This will not be easy for Alicija, but her grace will make her a beloved national figure.

Tragically, the real-life Lozakevica died far too young, in an unfortunate drowning accident. It is tough assignment for Erika Eglija, but she truly humanizes the revered independence leader. She deals with a lot of stuff throughout her life, as a social worker a dissident, and wife. In many respects, this is a deeply feminist story. Believe it or not, the Soviet Union was extremely patriarchal. Just ask the Latvian ballerina sexually assaulted by a powerful government official, one of Alicija’s final clients before launching her campaign.

NY Baltic ’23: Soviet Milk

Astra has not had many positive male models in her life. She never knew her dad, who disappeared while in the hands of the Soviet occupiers and the father of her own daughter is no longer in the picture. Arguably, Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s study of the underclass resulting from the breakdown of the family unit could have applied just as well to Latvia. Even though she is a gifted doctor, Astra is so embittered by the Communist system, she believes her own milk is toxic, so she withholds it from her baby Nora in Inara Kolmane’s Soviet Milk, which screens virtually as part of the 2023 New York Baltic Film Festival.

She was a shy but bright student, so it only follows Astra became a gifted doctor. However, her mothering skills and instincts are lacking. Since she cannot be bothered, Nora will largely be raised by her grandparents (Astra’s mother and her step-father, who is a decent man, but he too has been badly damaged by the Communist system).

When Astra secures a prestigious residency in Leningrad, she leaves Nora behind without a second thought. Ironically, her specialty becomes fertility, helping desperate women get pregnant. Unfortunately, she ruins her career when she violently confronts a serial domestic-abuser, because the authorities automatically side with him, against her. As a result, the only posting open to her is a remote rural clinic. Rather perversely, Astra now insists on bringing Nora, who loyally agrees.

Soviet Milk should be required viewing for all young socialists, because it shows how much the Soviet system was at odds with the values they profess to hold. Of course, there is no due process, as the prologue arrest of Astra’s father vividly illustrates. Wife-beaters are protected, but Astra is forbidden from treating, or even discussing the condition of her inter-sex friend, Jesse. As a bonus, Nora is instructed how to properly field strip infantry rifles as a member of the young pioneers.

Yet, more fundamentally, Soviet Milk bears witness to the regime’s concerted efforts to undermine the Church and the family as the building blocks of society. Astra is a good and “faithful” atheist, as per the state’s requirements, but the worldview she is forced to adopt makes her miserable.

Tribeca ’22: January

Early 1991 was an opportune time to be a film student in the Baltics, because history was exploding daily. It was also a dangerous time for the same reason. Jazis generally supports Latvian independence from their Soviet occupiers, but he has yet to mature to the point he can fully appreciate the gravity of the moment in Viesturs Kairiss’s January, which screens during this year’s Tribeca Film Festival.

Jazis wants to be the next Tarkovsky, which would ordinarily alarm most parents, but his anti-Communist mother is fine with it, along as he gets a draft deferral from his film school. The last thing she wants is to have her son in the Soviet army, potentially in harm’s way, while putting down democratic opposition movements. His father also basically agrees, even though he is a Party member. Unfortunately, Jazis’s drive and talent level will complicate matters.

For a while, his affair with Anna, a pretty fellow film student awakens some passion in him. However, when she falls under the influence of a famous filmmaker, Jazis spirals into depression and apathy. Yet, maybe the Soviet military’s attempts to stifle Baltic activism for independence might awaken him from his lethargy.

Kairiss skillfully uses a textured lo-fi style (including Super8), integrated with genuine historical archival footage, to recreate the tenor of the early 1990s in the Baltics quite vividly and evocatively. You really get a sense of the tension and potential violence that was literally hinging in the air. In one telling moments, Jazis asks an elderly woman if she was scared to deliver the food she baked for demonstrators. “No, I’ve been waiting 50 years for this,” she tells him.

January is highly effective time capsule and mood piece, but Jazis is so moody and sulky, we hardly get a sense of any character there within him. Arguably, many of the minor figures, like Jazis’s parents, resonate more than he and his film school-mates.

Submitted by Latvia: The Pit

This adaptation of Jana Egle’s short stories is sort of like a Latvian Short Cuts. It is also a coming-of-age story—a really dark one. Markuss is a tough kid to love, but we come to understand just how unloved he feels in Dace Puce’s The Pit, Latvia’s official Oscar submission for best international feature, which releases today in theaters and exclusively on Film Movement Plus.

Markuss is in big trouble, because he lured Emilija, a snotty little princess in his new neighborhood, into a pit in the woods and left her there. He was already a pariah in this provincial town. Now he is considered a monster. His grandmother, who is reluctantly serving as his guardian, seems to openly resent his presence. The rest of his local kin treats him with cold disdain, but their dysfunctional and sometimes abusive behavior behind closed doors is not so very different. His only friend is Sailor, the town outcast, whom his grandmother helps to support, despite her obvious contempt.

Some of the revelations Puce and co-screenwriter Monta Gagane have in store for viewers are fairly logical (a nicer term than predictable, in this case), but the way they emerge organically as the film progresses is still quite potent. There are some flashbacks, but they are employed judiciously and cleanly. After ten minutes, viewers will despise Markuss, but after seventy minutes, hearts will ache for him. It is a drastic dramatic reversal, but it is well-earned.

It is also helps that young Damir Onackis’ lead performance is remarkably powerful. He is raw and honest—quiet, but violent. This could very well be the best youthful performance of the year. Dace Eversa surprises us down the stretch as Grandma Solveiga, while the acutely human sadness of Indra Burkovaska’s Sailor is the perfect counterpoint to Markuss’s rage and confusion.

Nordic & Baltic Contenders: My Favorite War

Her parents were not exactly Romeo & Juliet, but growing up as the daughter of a Party member and an enemy of the state definitely led to a conflicted perspective on life in Iron Curtain-era Latvia. Frankly, Ilze Burkovska Jacobsen’s mother was never really guilty of anything. She just happened to be the daughter of a small land-owning farmer. Nevertheless, she was hounded and discriminated against up until the fall of Communism. For her part, Jacobsen tried to be a model Young Pioneer, taking inspiration from the Party propaganda built around the captive nation’s venerated WWII heroes. Jacobsen (currently based in Norway) revisits her Latvian youth and teen years in her animated-hybrid documentary, My Favorite War, which screens online as part of Scandinavia House’s Nordic & Baltic Contenders film series.

Despite her eventual disillusionment with the Communist Party’s corruption and hypocrisy, Jacobsen still loves and admires her father, a journalist, who was appointed the administrator for a small border village, near the infamous “Polygon” military installation. He did a lot for the town, as she remembers, but when he tragically died in a traffic accident, her mother reverted to being an enemy of the state. After the Soviets solidified control over the Baltics, her maternal grandfather had been exiled to Siberia, along with every other land-owning farmer, regardless of the size of their properties. This definitely was a source of tension between her grandfather and father, while the latter was still alive.

After his demise, Jacobsen savvily embraced the Young Pioneers as a vehicle to prove her loyalty and lay the groundwork for her future employability. Her role models were the WWII veterans who were the constant (almost Big Brother-like) stars of propaganda posters, movies, and TV shows, live-action footage from which Jacobsen cleverly incorporates into the animation. Yet, she was her grandfather’s granddaughter, so she inevitably noticed the falsehoods and double-standards of life around her. Conveniently, she was ready to start rebelling in the late 1980s.

Favorite War is a wonderfully constructed docu-memoir that is clearly the product Jacobsen’s acutely personal perspective, but still faithfully reflects the wider political and historical forces at play. There are several deeply poignant moments that sneak-up on viewers, even though Jacobsen diligently laid the groundwork for them, earlier in the film.

Submitted by Latvia: Blizzard of Souls

Only war can make a twenty-year-old this emotionally deadened and world-weary. That is what happens to Arturs Vanags. During a four year-period, he technically switches sides several times, first fighting against the Germans for the Russians, then against the Soviets, and finally against both. Yet, he always fights for Latvia. Viewers will see WWI turn into the Latvian War for Independence through the eyes of a young recruit in Dzintars Dreibergs’ Blizzard of Souls, Latvia’s official International Oscar submission and its all-time domestically-produced box office champ, which opens virtually this Friday.

After Germans casually kill his mother, Vanags and his father reluctantly flee their farm to Riga, where they enlist in the Latvian army. Technically, Vanags is too young, but his father gives his permission. Technically, the stern veteran is too old, but his sterling war record makes him valuable as a sergeant major (or the rough equivalent). Much to Vanags’s surprise, his father is probably harder on him than the other recruits, but veterans will well understand why.

During the first act, Blizzard follows the traditional arc of WWI movies, with the green enlisted men dealing with the horrible routine of trench warfare. However, the war will take a series of unusual turns for Vanags and his colleagues, because of the fateful position of the Baltics. Although they initially march to war wearing Latvian uniforms, they are clearly considered subservient to the Russian army (they aren’t even allowed to sing their national anthem). After the Revolution, the Bolsheviks first talk peace, but then start waging war again. Most of the Latvian Riflemen Corps are absorbed into the Latvian SSR, which again functions as a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Soviets. Inevitably, the call for genuine independence and the Soviets’ brutal purges drove experienced soldiers like Vanags into the Independence Brigades.

Screenwriter Boris Frumin makes all this complex military history quite clear, while maintaining the focus on Vanags’ grunt-level survival story. Oto Brantevics could not possibly look more milquetoast is his early scenes as young Vanags, but he undergoes a harrowing transformation, even more dramatic than George MacKay’s in 1917. MacKay provides far and away the most memorable performance in Mendes’ Oscar nominee, but Martins Vilsons is just as strong, or even stronger as crusty Old Man Vanags. It is a quiet but colorful and ultimately deeply humanistic portrayal.

The Mover: Latvian Rescuer Zanis Lipke

Zanis Lipke was a gruff, anti-Communist, blue collar booze-smuggler. He is not Hollywood’s stereotypical image of a dashing hero-figure, by any stretch of the imagination. Yet, he also had a Communist daughter, a Jewish best-friend, and a healthy aversion to oppressive authority. Probably the last characteristic most directly spurred him to save at least 50 Jewish Latvians during the National Socialist occupation (it also made him a suspicious outsider during the subsequent Soviet occupation too). Although more widely-reported rescuers like Schindler saved greater numbers of people, Lipke did more than most with his limited resources. The under-heralded Lipke is finally depicted on-screen, as the subject of Davis Simanis Jr.’s The Mover, which releases today on DVD, from Menemsha Films.

Lipke is a loving family man, but he is definitely not a touchy-feely type. He is alarmed by his daughter’s survival prospects after the Germans drove out the Soviets, but she is determined to try her luck behind the Russian lines (ultimately, she would be executed by her fellow Communists rather than the Nazis, but such ironies fall outside Simanis’s focus on Lipke’s rescue activities).

Initially, the realist in Lipke rebuffs his friend Arke Smolansky when he seeks shelter for his daughter, but the resulting guilt sickens him. Soon, he is reluctantly sheltering Jewish fugitives at his workplace, until an informer betrays them. It is a close shave for Lipke, but instead of scaring him into submission, it motivates him to redouble his efforts closer to home. With his wife’s grudging acquiescence, Lipke constructs a secret bunker under his work-shed, where he shelters dozens of escapees from the ghetto, with the intention of ferrying them to safety hidden in his truckloads of scavenged furniture (hence the title).

The Mover might sound like it follows a predictable arc (one established in films like Schindler’s List, In Darkness, and Saviors in the Night), but we should never allow ourselves to become blasé about the heroism Lipke displayed or the systemic horrors he witnessed. In fact, veteran Latvian thesp Arturs Skrastin is quite remarkable as Lipke, realistically portraying his curtness and abrasiveness, before viscerally conveying the shock and abject revulsion he felt while observing Rumbula Massacre, leaving him shaken to his core.

Panorama Europe ’14: Dream Team 1935

Evidently, they come pretty tall and well coordinated in the Baltics, considering their success in the European Basketball Championship (now known as EuroBasket). Lithuania won twice in the 1930’s and took gold again in 2003, but the very first champion was Latvia. Profoundly unheralded, the scrappy long-shots shocked the continent in 1935. It was a great Latvian triumph on the eve of great tragedy for many nations, Latvia included. With Russia once again menacing its neighbors, it is a fitting time to revisit one of the greatest moments of Latvian sporting history in Aigars Grauba’s Dream Team 1935 (trailer here), which screens during Panorama Europe at the Museum of the Moving Image.

It was a different game in 1930’s Europe. A jump ball followed every successful bucket and free throws were shot granny-style, but it was still handy to have an enforcer on the team. Vlademars Baumanis understands this only too well. Initially, the player-coach loses the Latvian championship because of some thuggish play. However, the victorious coach declines to take his team to the European championship, because the corrupt national sports committee has already squandered the ear-marked funds. While protesting to anyone who will listen, Baumanis accepts an instantly regretted dare to cobble together his own national team, trading in his uniform for a suit and tie.

Bitter rivals from both the Army and University Clubs will come together to represent Latvia, but it will take time to congeal as a true team. At least they will be in the best shape of the careers, thanks to relentless conditioning coach Rihards Deksenieks. Baumanis is a master strategist (at least by 1930’s standards) and the Latvia team has considerable skills, but just getting to Geneva will be an adventure thanks to the obstructionist sports committee.

Dream Team is a reliably entertaining underdogs-triumphant sport story, with some nicely rendered period details and a peppy big band soundtrack. Many basketball fanatics will probably be amused by the decidedly less glamorous style of play. Yet, Dream Team features one of the most devastating series of what-happened-to post-scripts of nearly any film. It turns out nearly every coach and player met a tragic end either as Soviet or National Socialist conscripts (sometimes both) during the war or in Soviet gulags afterward. (Nearly eighty years later, history threatens to repeat itself, as Russia once again casts a covetous eye on the Baltic Republics.)

Janis Amanis is a bit stiff as Baumanis, but he certainly looks earnest. In contrast, Vilis Daudzins plays Deksenieks with hardnosed charisma, while Marcis Manjakovs convincingly portrays the maturation of Latvia’s star player, Rudolfs Jurcins. Unfortunately, there is not much for Inga Alsina to do as Baumanis’s wife Elvira, except sitting around, having faith in him.

As a sports film, Dream Team is more successful than most. Despite the end never being in doubt, it moves along briskly and captures the tenor of the game as it was then played. It also suddenly feels uncomfortably topical given the ultimate fate of most of the team. It would make a good narrative companion to Marius Markevicius’s uplifting documentary, The Other Dream Team, chronicling the 1992 Olympic run of newly independent Lithuania’s men’s basketball team. Recommended for basketball fans and those who closely follow political and cultural developments in post-Soviet Eastern Europe, Dream Team 1935 screens this Sunday (4/6) at MoMI as part of Panorama Europe.

PSIFF ’14: Mother, I Love You

Quality musical instruments are expensive, even for middle class professionals in Riga. That is one reason Raimonds Krasts is reluctant to tell his perennially stressed out OBGYN mother he lost his saxophone, particularly since it happened during a bit of misdemeanor mischief. Each lie and evasion only makes matters worse for Krasts in Jānis Nords’ Mother, I Love You (trailer here), a Dostoyevskian middle school morality play that screens as part of the 2014 Palm Springs International Film Festival’s focus on official Academy Award submissions for best foreign language film.

There is already tension between Krasts and his single mother, Silvia Krasta. She has been secretly dating a colleague while supposedly working the late shift.  Frankly, it is unclear how Krasts feels about this, but there is no question Krasta is displeased with his behavioral issues at school. She is also none too thrilled about his friend from the wrong side of the tracks, Peteris Cepurnieks.  The son of a cleaning lady, Cepurnieks has swiped his mother’s key to a dodgy playboy’s often vacant apartment, where they often hang out and steal pocket money. 

When things get particularly heated at home, Krasts runs off to the bachelor pad, but cuts short his stay when the owner arrives with a prostitute.  Unfortunately, the woman in question filches his saxophone along with several other portable items from the flat.  Predictably his attempts to retrieve it lead to even more serious problems, because Krasts is still just a kid—one with particularly bad judgment.

Even though MILY did not make the Academy’s nine film short list, it was smart choice for Latvia.  As the winner of the Jury Award at this year’s LA Film Festival, it would have had more credibility and perhaps recognition among left coast Academy members than the average submission.  Nords’ brand of sensitive naturalism is also perfectly compatible with Academy tastes and preferences.  Evidently, it was not to be, but it is still an accomplished film. The work of cinematographer Tobias Datum is particularly noteworthy for the way it captures the moody elegance and loneliness of late night Riga.

Front-and-center throughout the film, thirteen year old lead-actor Kristofers Konovalovs holds up to the scrutiny remarkably well.  As problematic as Krasts might be, he never comes across as a caricature.  Instead, we can understand why he makes each compounding mistake.  Never overly showy, he could teach a thing or two to some of this year’s supposed Oscar contenders. 

Likewise, the performance of Vita Varpina (one of two established screen actors in MILY) is smartly balanced and acutely believable. Haralds Barzdins, the real life conductor for the Latvian Song and Dance Festival adds some color as Krasts’ band director, but it is debatable whether the film will do much to spur youthful enthusiasm for orchestral music.

There is indeed a lot of messy humanity in MILY.  Everyone makes mistakes, but nobody is irredeemable.  It should be interesting for festival patrons to watch the film in close dialogue with Kang Yi-kwan’s somewhat thematically related Juvenile Offender.  Nords never takes the easy way out, yet his film is still considerably more optimistic.  Small but potent, Mother, I Love You is recommended for those who appreciate coming-of-age character studies.  It screens this coming Sunday (1/5), Monday (1/6), and the following Saturday (1/11) during the 2014 Palm Springs International Film Festival.

Submitted by Latvia: Hong Kong Confidential

For nearly twenty years, Latvian director Maris Martinsons lived in Lithuania, which submitted his first film Loss as the country’s 2008 offering for official foreign language Oscar consideration, even though it was set in Ireland. Martinsons’ world citizen ethos is again exemplified by his second film, Hong Kong Confidential, another global co-production, in this case submitted to the Academy’s foreign language division by the director’s native Latvia, though obviously filmed in scenic HK. Confidential (a.k.a. Amaya, trailer here) is one of this year’s harder submissions to pigeon hole, well beyond its multinational pedigree, yet it is strangely beguiling and certainly worthy of a product tour on the festival circuit, regardless of Oscar love.

The English-speaking Paul is not a tourist, he is a traveler, visiting far-flung Asian locales in search of traditional and exotic massage techniques. In HK, he signs up for classes taught by the Chinese master Tao, where he seems to have an odd effect on the employees. At first the attractive Jasmine resents his rather confident flirtation, but the older Amaya is intrigued by the mystery man.

Amaya is also something of an outsider, a Japanese expatriate who has made a home with her dull but loving dry-cleaner husband. She is relatively happy, but misses her grown son working in a far-off fishing village. Indeed, everyone in Confidential is missing or yearning for someone and each keeps his own secrets.

Martinsons deftly walks a fine line in Confidential, playing all sorts of narrative games in the background, while foregrounding the film with deceptively accessible relationship dramas and even moments of light comedy. Frankly, it is an odd experience watching a film that is so emotionally engaging, yet also something of a head-scratcher—but that is not a bad thing.

It all works because of the caliber of his cast. Written for the great Japanese actress Kaori Momoi (whose credits include Kurosawa’s Kagemusha and a flat-out awesome supporting turn in Takashi Miike’s otherwise disappointing Sukiyaki Western Django), she brings a mature beauty and a wonderful sense of dignity to the film as Amaya. In fact, her understated wisdom helps sell the film’s riskier, more mystical scenes. Though Andrius Momotovas’ English often sounds more than a bit phonetic, he has a fascinating screen presence, developing real chemistry with the ensemble. There is also something quite haunting about Monie Tung’s performance as the beautiful but wounded Jasmine.

What most distinguishes Confidential is the degree to which Martinsons maintains his characters auras of mystery without indulging in obscurity for its own sake, a la David Lynch. It would surely frustrate more conventional viewers, but it unquestionably establishes its own unique tone, further heightened by the original music composed by lead actor Momotovas (whose catchy song “The World is Full of Love” is at least as Oscar-worthy as nine-tenths of this year’s forty-one qualified tunes). There is no question Confidential is a long shot for the foreign language nomination, but it ought to rank in the top ten percentile of the field. If Academy members paid attention during their screenings, anything is possible.