Litsid: The Whores

I found this being played on... New Zealand public television, of all places! I really liked it. A bit slow at first, but then it gets interesting enough that you just want to see one more episode, and then one more, and one more... Gives a lovely historical context to something that many people have been taught about in school - WW2 and how warring nations occupied and bombed Northern Europe - but seeing it through the eyes of prostitutes is much more memorable than seeing a documentary, I think. Well worth a look! A couple of verrrrry cringy moments though, such as Mrs Falkenberg trying to speak in Estonian with a "German accent" - please just hang in there. These moments will pass :)

I'm not sure why this receives such strong rating. As other reviewers have noted, it's an interesting premise. But, as others have complained, it is also quite slow. In many ways, it is quite old-fashioned, almost like a kind of quasi-melodrama, with many declaimed and over-acted lines. I'm not sure whether this is deliberate, artistic effort to give a sense of stage-plays of the time or whether it's just over-acting and cumbersome directing. Most episodes have a heavy-handed pedagogical slant, with the actors being used to declaim key events at the beginning of the war, particularly in regard to Russia's invasion of Finland. Obviously, they need to find a way to communicate this to many viewers, but it adds to the slow pace and sense of clumsy direction. The final episode leaves a sense that further series were anticipated but not shot, so viewers are also left with a sense of being left hanging.

A pity. Promising, but it never quite works.

If you like dreamlike atmosphere and nostalgic look, you may like this. It might appear somewhat slow at first, but once the action picks up, it draws you in for good. Very good actresses and dialogue, lots of sweet music and vintage costumes and sets. Spies, enemy soldiers, traitors. Everybody plays everybody.

I watched bravely the first 15 min of this opus. It was boooring. So I can't even recommend this to those of you having nothing else to do. Better have a cup of tea and take a nap.

We've been waiting for a good history series in Estonia for quite a long time. This one is different, not your typical heroism tale but from a view point of hookers, who are drawn into political games. It's been compared to Babylon Berlin and Dawnton Abbey, even as the budget is like thousand times smaller. It takes off slow but once it gets going, it's an exiting tale of spies and murder but first of all a story of a country drawn slowly into war and losing its independence. Very good actors.