Ivo Briedis

Almost 30 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union we can observe the return of rhetoric of a strong person of the totalitarian era. Could this be facilitated by the remains of totalitarian subservience in our heads and minds? The Director of the film Ivo Briedis and journalist Rita Ruduša, both born in the USSR, are going on a journey to explore the phenomenon of “Homo Sovieticus” and to discover whether a human being of the totalitarian mindset has specific geographical boundaries.

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During Latvia’s centennial year, 15 filmmakers created each his own film portrait of a person living in Latvia on the background of centenary events. Documentary 2018 combines these stories into a unique poetic vision based on analogy with the documentary 235 000 000, a classic of the Riga school of poetic documentary cinema. This film is an attempt to make sure whether the codes of the poetic cinema are still relevant and accessible today.

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A message brought by the wind urges a lonely man to go out to the city, but there is someone who does not want him to leave the room.

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After the fall of the Soviet Union large numbers of immigrants from the East stayed in Latvia for good, Latvians simply call them “Russians”. Over 20 years of independence later mutual suspicion and bias are still there in the most part of the local community. Therefore, a Latvian director involves an independent Russian speaking Norwegian colleague in helping him understand Latvian “Russians” and coming up with an integration plan. But soon enough it becomes clear that only Latvians themselves can manage the challenge. And so begins director’s journey away from the division “us / them”.

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Three young men head to an isolated country house to shoot a film that they hope will bring them fame. They have no experience, but possess the will to change their lives. They make various attempts, but none seem to work. The team comes to a creative impasse, but the stakes are too high to give up. In hopes of drawing out their talents, they spend more and more time chipping away at each other. Previously hidden character traits come to light further complicating their relationship and the making of the film. Soon it's each man for himself. Just when the experiment seems utterly failed, one of them is discovered dead. It's not clear whether it's accidental, suicide or murder, but a real body in the scene satisfies - this could be the start of The Film.

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Ingus is a man around forty, utterly happy with his bachelor life, until one day chatty Žanete moves in next door and upsets the usual course of things. He might, of course, ignore her, but some overwhelming force makes him act differently.

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Summer, 1944. A military airbase near the very front-line. A young soviet pilot Sergey makes his first practice flight. In the course of this flight he hears a call for help on the radio from Russian pilots, having an unequal air combat with superior forces of the enemy. Sergey rushes to their rescue. His plane gets shut down, and he is taken prisoner. Soon he is taken to a special flight school, where future German aces are prepared and Russian pilots at the wheel of captured Russian aircrafts are used as living targets. Nobody wants to put up with such situation, and they prepare an escape.

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In a 17th century Swedish Livonian village, constant rain and drunkenness prevail. When a stolen relic sparks witchcraft accusations, an 80-year-old self-proclaimed werewolf named the Dog of God arrives with a mysterious gift: The Devil’s Balls.

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Based on true events, a historical drama about one man's struggle against the authorities that leads to a mutiny on a Soviet warship.

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A miniseries about the events during one summer in a family of a writer who are unexpectedly granted a remote estate with all its unusual inhabitants, and who has to decide what to do with the dilapidated estate. Exciting and comic events in eight episodes in which the future writer Anšlavs Eglītis together with his brother Vidvuds, father Viktors and his wife Hilda Vīka, begin the restoration of the estate, at the same time opening a boarding house, which becomes the intersection and summer stage of the neighbourhood, ghosts of the past, visitors from the city and Latvian intellectuals in Latvia in the 1920s.

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A story about Emīlija Benjamiņa, the “queen of the press” in interwar Latvia, whose wealth and tragic fate have since become folklore. The film’s narrative covers the period from the beginnings of Emīlija’s magazine Atpūta (Recreation), to her arrest and slow demise in a train en route to Siberia. The most prominent clairvoyant of the time - Eugene Fink’s prophecy that Emīlija would die from starvation in a foreign land (which served to be true) weaves through the narrative as a red thread. With this strong woman at the centre of the story, the film shows Latvian society in all its richness and gives the audience the opportunity to meet many well-known historical figures.

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