Kihnu Collection

Kihnu is a small island in the Gulf of Riga. Soosaar looks at the islanders from the point of view of an explorer, just like his filmmaking hero Robert Flaherty once did. Their traditional lifestyle unfolds in front of his camera: customary songs and rituals, and heartfelt images of people’s daily lives.

In 1986, twelve years after his film Kihnu Naine (The women of Kishnou), Mark Soosaar made this complementary documentary at the centre of which are the male inhabitants of the island. With a bitter undertone to it, Soosaar shows how, to this view, a lack of possibilities for self-government and the conceited attitude of the mainland towards the islanders have caused great problems to this society. The island has been negligently placed under far too large a kolkhoz. Enormous alcoholism is prevalent among the male population and, increasingly, among the women. Sheer possession of money has become a standard of regard. If a family cannot spare 4,000 roubles for the marriage of their children, they are ignored by the other islanders. In this dramatic as well as poetic documentary we see how the social awareness of a society has gone by the board. Merely concrete and strict reformations can improve the situation the island is in.