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Karu süda (2001)
True mythical masterpiece by former Estonian hunter
This movie is based on autobiographic novel "Bear's heart" written by Nikolai Baturin. It is a movie about an Estonian man Niika who travels to north, where nganasans live. He becomes a hunter. The story explains how Niika learns from ancient nature and people who are shaped by the ways of this nature the principles of life and death. He tries to become (a real) human ("nganasan" means human in Nganasanish). The movie tells a story how the hunter journey is really an inner journey, to find peace and inner tranquility, all this is done by mythical cognition.
It is a real pearl in Estonian literature as well as in filmography. The scenery is pure (authentic) and meditative. It contains scenes that may be shockingly hmmm.... natural. The part is played very well by Rain Simmul who performs flawlessly. It is needless to say that the movie includes quite many best Estonian actors and actresses. The two-hour long feature film only uses part of the text and there are some factual differences e.g. the events take place in 80-s in a book, but 90-s in a movie. In any case the timing has no meaning in a place where time has stood still for centuries. The movie is definitely very beautiful (as it was the most expensive movie in Estonia at the time it was released), but it has an inner side which gives us a glimpse of personal journey of a hunter. The movie is rich of ancient finno-ugric elements e.g. the bear is considered to be Estonian ancestor. The author of the screenplay is considered to be a real word artist that has changed Estonian literature forever. The movie is absolutely enjoyable even to usual western people who are indifferent to nature. In that way we can say that the movie is very "exotical".