Third Assistant Director
The love story of sixteen-year-old Arturs is interrupted by the First World War. After losing his mother and his home, he finds some consolation in joining the army, because this is the first time national battalions are allowed in the Russian Empire. But war is nothing like Arturs imagined – no glory, no fairness. It is brutal and painful. Arturs is now completely alone as war takes the lives of his father and brother. Also, no progress is made in the promised quick resolution of the war and timely return home. Within the notion that only he alone cares about returning home and that his homeland is just a playground for other nations, Arturs finds strength for the final battle and eventually returns home to start everything from scratch, just like his newly born country.
Writer
Summer, 1989. City girls, Paula and Laura, spend their summer holidays in a small town with their cousins, Maija and Linda. Four girls, left unattended, enjoy freedom, imitate the life of adults, plunge into reckless adventures and get into trouble. Based on true events, nine-year-old Paula’s story of growing up is set against the background of time when Lat-via made her first steps towards independence.
Director
Summer, 1989. City girls, Paula and Laura, spend their summer holidays in a small town with their cousins, Maija and Linda. Four girls, left unattended, enjoy freedom, imitate the life of adults, plunge into reckless adventures and get into trouble. Based on true events, nine-year-old Paula’s story of growing up is set against the background of time when Lat-via made her first steps towards independence.
Editor
The old gardener works all day in harmony with nature’s rhythms and the wisdom of the ancient Latvians. His happiness and fulfillment is a garden that no longer belongs to him, but he feels like it does due to his large contribution to it. He speaks to the garden, and it responds, giving him shelter and a rich harvest. Autumn arrives and there is much work, more than the gardener can handle. The young homeowners, desiring to make the gardener’s life easier, hire a new gardener. The old gardener’s love of the garden and his unwillingness to share it with anyone else leads him to make an inevitable decision to stay in the garden of his family forever. This is a poetically symbolic story about disappearing time, the land and modern reality.
Screenplay
The old gardener works all day in harmony with nature’s rhythms and the wisdom of the ancient Latvians. His happiness and fulfillment is a garden that no longer belongs to him, but he feels like it does due to his large contribution to it. He speaks to the garden, and it responds, giving him shelter and a rich harvest. Autumn arrives and there is much work, more than the gardener can handle. The young homeowners, desiring to make the gardener’s life easier, hire a new gardener. The old gardener’s love of the garden and his unwillingness to share it with anyone else leads him to make an inevitable decision to stay in the garden of his family forever. This is a poetically symbolic story about disappearing time, the land and modern reality.
Director
The old gardener works all day in harmony with nature’s rhythms and the wisdom of the ancient Latvians. His happiness and fulfillment is a garden that no longer belongs to him, but he feels like it does due to his large contribution to it. He speaks to the garden, and it responds, giving him shelter and a rich harvest. Autumn arrives and there is much work, more than the gardener can handle. The young homeowners, desiring to make the gardener’s life easier, hire a new gardener. The old gardener’s love of the garden and his unwillingness to share it with anyone else leads him to make an inevitable decision to stay in the garden of his family forever. This is a poetically symbolic story about disappearing time, the land and modern reality.
Writer
The mundane life of Rita, a nurse and a single mum, changes when she sets eyes on a young photographer named Ernest. Meanwhile, an unexpected encounter with her ex-husband and the father of her child brings back hopes and desires of the past that challenge Rita’s true feelings.
Director
The mundane life of Rita, a nurse and a single mum, changes when she sets eyes on a young photographer named Ernest. Meanwhile, an unexpected encounter with her ex-husband and the father of her child brings back hopes and desires of the past that challenge Rita’s true feelings.
First Assistant Director
The Hijacker lands the plane at the Rīga Airport. 7 year-old Tom, travelling on his own, voluntarily becomes a hostage. Along with the traditional demands, the Hijacker adds the demands of the little hostage – beginning with some local chocolate and a self-instruction tape for learning the native language, and ending with organizing a Song Festival and a special biathletes’ performance – all ideas originating from a CD on Latvia.
After twelve years in the city Jānis returns to the country and marries his first love - now a widow with three children - Aija. But the happiness is not meant to be because the husband and the wife share different views of life and, ultimately, can't work out their relationships.
Ida
One of the iconic Latvian movies. Based on Astrid Lindgren's book 'Emil of Lönneberga'. A story of a little boy, Emil, who, according to others is incredibly naughty, but actually Emil is a lot more kind hearted than all the rest. And everything he does is to help someone. But somehow it all the time turns out like a prank. His family won't agree with any pranks on themselves, so there goes Emil in his father's tool shed, where he's locked up for every prank. Includes the phrase - 'the main idea is to keep your feet warm', which has been adapted in Latvian culture, so it's already a saying.
