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Eastern Europe, the new century. Wolflike laws and a wolflike appetite. There are still a few who look for the withered tree of knowledge of good and evil, planning to build quality office furniture out of it.
— Dante Alighieri, “Divine Comedy.” Inferno, Song I
“The Temptation of St. Tony” is a film about a man, who has reached middle age, and finds himself in exactly the kind of darkening forest that Dante describes. An unusual problem intrudes upon his moderately prosperous and quiet life – morality. Is it possible to be a ‘good person’? What does that mean anyway? And what’s in it for you?
On his journey towards a clearer conscience but an increasingly complicated reality, Tony meets several typical specimens familiar from contemporary Estonian society and lives through exciting adventures, not without some diverting humor. And it starts to seem that slowly, and quite inevitably, the man loses his job, his family, and finally reality itself.
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“The Temptation of St. Tony” is an Estonian/Swedish/Finnish co-production (corresponding financial participation 65% / 21% / 14%). The Estonian production company is Homeless Bob Production, the Swedish co-producer is ATMO / Kristina Aberg and the Finnish co-producer is Bronson Club /Jesse Fryckman, Tero Kaukomaa.
It is the first Estonian feature film that has received support from the international co-production fund EURIMAGES (1.8 million Estonian kroons). In 2008, Veiko Õunpuu received the European Talent Award at the Cannes International Film Festival for the script of “The Temptation of St. Tony”.
Veiko Õunpuu’s last feature film, “Autumn Ball”, won over 15 awards at international film festivals, including the Orizzonti Award at the Venice International Film Festival in 2007. That same year, the film also won six awards at Tallinn’s Black Nights Film Festival.
© Gabriela Järvet
© Gabriela Järvet
© Gabriela Järvet
© Kaarel Nurk
© Kaarel Nurk
© Jarand Rorgemoen
© Kaarel Nurk
© Jarand Rorgemoen
© Jarand Rorgemoen
© Jarand Rorgemoen
© Jarand Rorgemoen
© Vahur Puik
© Kaarel Nurk
© Jarand Rorgemoen
© Jarand Rorgemoen
© Jarand Rorgemoen
© Jarand Rorgemoen
© Jarand Rorgemoen
© Jarand Rorgemoen
Veiko Õunpuu is a writer, artist and film director. Sometime lecturer, this ex-carpet salesman (who never made a sale) has directed 1 short and 2 feature length films which have excited critics and left audiences enthralled, appalled and puzzled. He is now directing a play.
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ATMO Bronson Club Dante Alighieri Divine Comedy Estonia Finnish Homeless Bob Jesse Fryckman Katrin Kissa Tallinn Tero Kaukomaa. Wolflike
Tony appearing at the Helsinki Film Festival from Sept 16th-26th.
Film times:
Fri 17/09 18.30 – Kinopalatsi 8
Sat 18/09 16.30 – Maxim 1
Sun 19/09 14.00 – Maxim 2
http://www.hiff.fi/lang-en/themes/tere-eesti/event/2428—the-temptation-of-st-tony
Olive Films too tempted by St Tony, picks up Õunpuu’s new feature for the US & Canada
12.02.2010
Just prior to its international market première at the European Film Market in Berlin, new Danish sales outfit, LevelK, has sold Estonian director Veiko Õunpuu’s The Temptation of St Tony to Olive Films for US distribution.
LevelK ceo Tine Klint was happy to leave the American launch in the hands of the Chicago-based company specialising in foreign-language art house films and US indies and classics, seeking out “ageless stories that have been artfully conveyed.”
“Masterfully shot and edited, Õunpuu’s film is a marvelous cinematic expression of the Kafkaesque story of good and evil, without the temptation to rigidly define ‘good’ and ‘evil’,” said Olive Films chief Farhad Arshad, who negotiated the deal with Klint.
Described as a “parable on the new, wolf like capitalism in Eastern Europe with its compassionless capitalist rules and rulers,” Õunpuu’s second feature follows a middle-aged, mid-level manager (Taavi Eelmaa) trying to tackle a heap of emotional problems.
The Temptation of St Tony was selected for this year’s VRPO Tiger Awards at the International Film Festival Rotterdam. It was the first Estonian feature ever to screen in Sundance, and the first non-Swedish film to close Sweden’s Göteborg International Film Festival.
“Veiko Õunpuu’s bold, contemporary update of the stations-of-the-cross genre more than lives up to the promise of his 2007 debut, Autumn Ball. His imprimatur is on every frame of this delicious black-and-white prestige product,” wrote Howard Feinstein in Screen International.
Also represented by Klint, Autumn Ball (Sügisball) won the Horizons Award in Venice, adding more than 20 festival prizes at Tallinn’s Black Nights, Thessaloniki, Marrakech, Valencia, Brussels and Bratislava. It was acquired for the US by Strand Releasing.
LevelK’s line-up for the company’s first European Film Market includes Norwegian director Gunnar Vikene’s award-winning Vegas, with Norwegian Shooting Star Anders Baasmo Christiansen, and Danish director Giacomo Campeotto’s kidpic, Storm.
This looks superb, look forward to seeing the whole film.
Veiko Õunpuu’s second feature, “The Temptation of St. Tony”, was chosen as the first Estonian film to screen at the Sundance Film Festival in Utah, USA.
The Sundance Film Festival takes place at the end of January and is the most important indie film festival in the USA. Sundance receives over 9000 submissions each year; this year’s international competition selected its 14 feature films out of 1022 submissions.
