Püha Tõnu kiusamine

I have to agree with all of the previous Positive reviews (only 6 right now...) with the references to Roy Anderson, Kubrick, Buñuel and Tarkofsky - I also thought superficially of Eraserhead by David Lynch. Shot in black and white, except for his Bentley and modern house, this film looks like it could have been made in the 1960s. A masterful effort, disturbing but with "painterly" composition and good acting. Some of the references, religious and otherwise (like a black dog he accidentally hits with his car, then reappears alive, only to be killed by his wife), escape me, but I would definitely see this a second time. I'm amazed a film like this can be so ignored and unknown.

I think it's an awesome film. I watched it twice, a few months apart. Gotta let the first watch settle I guess.

Tony is a decent guy but the world he lives in has some values that are crappy. Well, that's our world isn't it. Should we give to the poor person who bothers us? While we're having a fine time in our nice homes.

Who is cheating on who, mistrusting wife says to doubting husband. His lover finds him nice, and her father is a miserable man.

Bur none of this prepares you for the final third of this movie when he goes to a strange club after his girlfriend is kidnapped and taken there. Things get real strange then, and the last part of this movie is terrific and bizarre.

New Õunpuu's film is a real jewel in contemporary cinema. It confirms his bright talent and distinctive sense for storytelling. "Temptation of St. Tony" is full of epic scenes which (one day) might get praised as some of the highest cinema peaks of our time. Leading you trough the dark corridors of mankind director awards the viewer after each corner with such visual brilliancy that you can't get irrelevant. Cinematic language of "Temptation of St. Tony" is closer to classics like Antonioni, Bunuel or Tarkovsky than to contemporary film making styles. After "Sügisbal" and "St. Tony" it's sure that we have a new, complete author on cinematic stage. Let's celebrate.

A film that follows the travails of a middle management guy through a black-and-white Estonia, leading from funerals to swamps to theatres, from dinner parties to ruined churches and a cannibal cabaret nightclub.

This is an unusual and original film... whilst it has echoes of film-makers such as Roy Andersson or Bela Tarr, it is also clear that Ounpuu has his own original voice to develop. In a few places the surrealism or absurdism seemed, to me, a bit forced or self-conscious,but in many places the film is truly unique, funny, disturbing, odd, dreamlike and poignant. An unhoned, rough talent maybe, but a big one.. I'll look forward to his next film...

Second feature from the Estonian director of the highly acclaimed Sugisball charts the catastrophic breakdown of the life of a dull, provincial middle-manager. Comparison with Tarkovsky and others may be premature but this is no sophomore effort and is worth taking seriously as it's full of impressive, meticulous scenes, ranging from droll to oddball to deeply disturbing, with good use of ambient music and innovative camera-work (surprisingly, still possible).

The narrative, in five parts, is sparse and evidently a large dose of obscurantism was added during the editing. At first it looks like a bleak comedy, then it seems to morph into a religious allegory (there's a fine scene where a priest walks up the wall) before developing into a quite nasty Lynchian nightmare involving cannibalism.

One synopsis I read bears scant relation to what I saw - the diabolic choice given to Tony by the 'Meister' whether to rebel or conform (presumably a simple metaphor of life under the Soviets) was absent - which may be just as well, because the obscurity of the narrative provides much of the atmosphere.