The Cinematheque

“A story of great intensity … Olga Šepicka’s [lead performance] is dignified and enigmatic, a wrenchingly tactile portrayal.”

Līga Požarska, Cineuropa

Dāvis Sīmanis Jr., writer-director of Exiled (EUFF 2016) and The Year Before the War (EUFF 2021), here offers a powerful historical drama shot in luminous black and white. The film is based on the true story of Marija Leiko, a famous actor who becomes both a witness to and victim of Stalin’s brutal regime. In 1937, the former silent film star travels to Russia after learning of the birth of her granddaughter. Discovering tragic circumstances upon her arrival, she is persuaded by KGB agents to stay, abandoning her film career to join the Latvian State Theatre in Moscow. Increasingly aware that she is being manipulated by the government during its ruthless purges of political enemies, she must choose between family and career, and between her artistic ideals and the policies of Stalinism.

In Latvian, Russian, and German with English subtitles