Despite its miracle economy, Estonia as a country has also suffered through a lot of economic uncertainty. Westerners might believe that Estonians (and other ex-Soviet occupied realms) would just be thankful to have freedom, but that view is faulty. Certainly there is a different form of freedom, but is there more freedom? Now you can fly anywhere, if you have money. Now there is no menacing Russian bureaucracy, but there are new invaders called multinational corporations with subtler forms of censorship. One look at the stifling homogenizing characteristics of ‘global culture’ clearly shows that differences of opinion are still not entirely encouraged or welcomed. And now Estonia is doing all it can, it seems, to win the favour of the European Union. But as Riho Unt’s Back to Europe suggests, what is the difference between this Union and the Soviet Union? Are not Estonia’s culture, language and resources still at risk of being assimilated by outside countries?

Mait Laas' work is filled with visually arresting images, as in Way To Nirvana.

The choice of Heidmets, Kivi, Unt, Volmer and now Laas, has been a fortuitous one. All are heavily involved in a variety of artistic and cultural fields in Estonia today and have all had international success with their films. Certainly it has been hard on Nukufilm. Unt is the only one consistently visible at Nukufilm. With limited funding, there are only so few opportunities to make films. Volmer has been busy in theatre; Heidmets with live-action films and television production; and Kivi with puppet theatre work. In 2002-03, Heidmets and Volmer will be making their first puppet films in many years.

The fragmentation of Nukufilm has hurt the studio to some degree, but on the other hand the scattered nature of the studio has ensured that a wide array of voices are given the chance to be heard. The result is that Nukufilm has no single aesthetic style like the Priit Pärn ‘style’ that Joonisfilm might be said to possess.

That being said, Riho Unt has become the creative backbone of Nukufilm. He is a focussed and generous artist. When he’s not working on his own films, he’s actively tutoring a number of young aspiring animation artists just as Tuganov and Pars did before him. By sharing his experience and knowledge that he himself acquired in part through Tuganov and Pars, Unt is like a bridge linking the young animators with the ‘grandfathers.’ And yet during this process, he is acquiring new ways of thinking and seeing from his younger colleagues. Nukufilm is a fine example of how the Estonian animation oral tradition has maintained an active dialogue between past and present.

For any animation studio to survive 45 years is exceptional, but consider what Nukufilm has confronted and overcome: a variety of obstacles, from a lack of formal animation training to the cruel absurdities of both Soviet censorship and globalization. That Nukufilm has consistently produced an innovative, varied and internationally acclaimed body of work is miraculous. 

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Chris Robinson is the artistic director of the Ottawa International Animation Festival and the Ottawa International Student Animation Festival. He is also the editor of the semi-annual ASIFA Magazine. Robinson has curated film programs and served on festival juries throughout the world. He writes a monthly column ("The Animation Pimp”) for Animation World Network and has written for Salon.com, Cinemascope, Take One, 12gauge, City Pages and others. Robinson contributed a chapter on English-Canadian animation to the book, North of Everything: English-Canadian Cinema Since 1980. His book Between Genius and Utter Illiteracy: A Story of Estonian Animation will be published in May. He is currently at work on a strange book about childhood, alcoholism and an ex-hockey player tentatively called The Boy Who Never Grew Up.