The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

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eerik
Joined: Sun Mar 22, 2009 4:53 pm
Location: Estonia

The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#1 Post by eerik » Thu Jun 04, 2009 5:15 am

Image
Original Estonian title: Püha Tõnu kiusamine

About the movie:
"The Temptation of St. Tony" is the second full length feature film from award winning Estonian auteur Veiko Õunpuu.This time it's a co-production between Homeless Bob Production (Estonia), Bronson Club (Finland) and ATMO (Sweden). Õunpuu recieved European New Talent Prize for this project and it was awarded by European Union's MEDIA programme. It will premiere in September or October.

Synopsis:
Tony develops an aversion to gushing claims of his goodness and the issue starts to haunt him. Is he good? Why should one be good? Whom would it benefit? While Tony thinks and thinks, he is forced to fire the one thousand employees under his command, to be a witness to his wife’s betrayal, to bury his grandfather, and finally to find 12 pairs of human hands in the underbrush. As Tony hopes to find a new and simpler life in a strip club with the help of a Russian secretary named Nadezhda who is earning extra money by working there, fate steps into his life in the form of the mysterious Herr Meister. He gives Tony a choice – either a rebellion doomed to failure and perish, or absolute submission and a life full of power and enjoyment. Though Tony is accustomed to a worry-free life, he chooses rebellion – much to his own surprise – and looses. Man is truly a bottomless abyss.


Links:
IMDb profile
Full trailer
Very early teaser @ Youtube. Shots from first 20 minutes only.
Official webpage
Last edited by eerik on Thu Dec 24, 2009 4:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#2 Post by eerik » Mon Sep 14, 2009 12:31 pm

Estonian premiere date announced for 10th October. 8-)

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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#3 Post by eerik » Sat Sep 19, 2009 3:29 am


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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#4 Post by eerik » Thu Dec 03, 2009 12:10 pm

Announced as a part of Sundance 2010 competition!

Estonian DVD is available @ http://www.cdmarketengland.co.uk/en/sho ... _kiusamine" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Last edited by eerik on Thu Dec 24, 2009 6:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#5 Post by eerik » Fri Dec 11, 2009 5:17 pm


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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#6 Post by eerik » Thu Dec 24, 2009 4:44 pm

Review @ QuietEarth.us

Few other links:
http://divedivedive.org/film/the-temptation-of-st-tony" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://www.theauteurs.com/films/21832" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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carax09
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#7 Post by carax09 » Thu Dec 24, 2009 8:03 pm

Any idea why the dvd is described as being in "colour" on cdmarket?

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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#8 Post by eerik » Fri Dec 25, 2009 4:22 am

carax09 wrote:Any idea why the dvd is described as being in "colour" on cdmarket?
No. I have it and it is black and white like it should be.

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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#9 Post by eerik » Mon Dec 28, 2009 2:44 pm

Estonian film critics and film journalists voted "The Temptation of St. Tony" the best Estonian film in 2009 and 10th best movie in Estonian film theatres in 2009.

Their TOP10, if you are interested:
1. Entre les murs
2. Antichrist
3. Gomorra
4. Gran Torino
5. Inglourious Basterds
6. The Wrestler
7. Gake no ue no Ponyo
8. District 9
9. Vicky Cristina Barcelona
10. The Temptation of St. Tony

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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#10 Post by eerik » Tue Jan 12, 2010 12:53 pm

Danish distributor LevelK picked up "The Temptation of St. Tony" and Õunpuu's previous film "Autumn Ball". "The Temptation..." will be featured at Berlin film market in February. Also, the film is in Rotterdam and Götheborg film festival's line-ups.

Read more:
http://cineuropa.org/newsdetail.aspx?la ... tID=128508" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://www.screendaily.com/news/distrib ... 24.article" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#11 Post by eerik » Thu Feb 11, 2010 10:52 am


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Camera Obscura
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#12 Post by Camera Obscura » Thu Feb 11, 2010 6:54 pm

eerik wrote:Danish distributor LevelK picked up "The Temptation of St. Tony" and Õunpuu's previous film "Autumn Ball". "The Temptation..." will be featured at Berlin film market in February. Also, the film is in Rotterdam and Götheborg film festival's line-ups.

Read more:
http://cineuropa.org/newsdetail.aspx?la ... tID=128508" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://www.screendaily.com/news/distrib ... 24.article" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
I haven't seen it, but the other week it picked up some really good buzz at the IFF Rotterdam. Sort of the festival surprise. It will probably get some distribution around these parts as well.

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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#13 Post by eerik » Sat Feb 27, 2010 2:34 pm

Attention all New Yorkers, "The Temptation of St. Tony" will be screened next Friday (March 5th) @ BAMcinématek.

Also screened @ Hong Kong International Film Festival later in March.

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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#14 Post by eerik » Fri Mar 05, 2010 12:43 pm



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eerik
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#16 Post by eerik » Sat Sep 18, 2010 3:54 am

The Playlist gave it an A- and you can find some more reviews at Rottentomatoes.com.

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swo17
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#17 Post by swo17 » Tue Mar 01, 2011 12:59 pm

I'm curious what others here make of this film. It's beautifully shot to be sure, with some powerful sequences that instantly brought to my mind Roy Andersson, Wenders, Lynch, Buñuel, Tarr, Greenaway, and a Les Savy Fav concert, but I'm not quite sure what it all adds up to in the end, or if it finally contributes much on its own other than a series of very well done homages. I think I say this because, when I mention specific names above, it's not that I was reminded stylistically of these directors, but of specific scenes from these directors' films. In any case, I thought it was a highly entertaining film, and I'd certainly recommend that everyone with a taste for the bizarre (and a bit of a stomach for cannibalism!) check it out. It's out now on DVD from Olive Films.

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JeanRZEJ
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Re: The Temptation of St. Tony (Veiko Õunpuu, 2009)

#18 Post by JeanRZEJ » Sat Mar 12, 2011 11:54 pm

I saw this when it came through town early in the year, and it was fantastically bizarre in all the right ways. It is obviously riffing off of a wide range of sources, and everyone seems to come up with distinct lists of 3 definite influences, and no two lists are the same, and many end up being entirely distinct from the others. It's that sort of thing. swo17 gives 7, which I guess is fitting, although perhaps he should have gone all the way to 17. There is a sequence involving the police which is highly reminiscent of Kafka's The Trial, and there were some stylistic touches that reminded me of Grandrieux. I read an interview with the director and he was very, very cinema literate, so it would surprise me if he had not seen works from all of the people mentioned, and perhaps he was even riffing directly on their works. I don't think it really matters much. Recently I watched They All Loved Each Other So Much, The Dreamers, and Easy A, all films directly referencing the films they are riffing off of. If The Temptation of St. Tony is merely the sum of its stylistic referents, as those films are to some degree, then it is by far the best of those and does it without making an obvious point of it. I happen to find it to be more like a phoenix birthed in the flames of those influences, and I think it outdoes many of the potential points of reference handily.

The film goes through a variety of visual, atmospheric, and comedic modes, though, pretty consistently achieving them all with compelling skill. I'm a big fan of the sort of phantasmagoria the film achieves, I'm an even bigger fan of the kind of grotesque humor it achieves, and perhaps most of all a fan of the ambivalent tragicomic approach the film takes. As such, the film was almost tailor-made for my tastes, and it instantly became one of my favorite films, but there are certainly elements which play much stronger than others for me. I don't mean that as a criticism, because I think the confluence of such a diverse array of elements is both incredibly difficult to pull off and extremely rewarding, and in fact reminds me a great deal more of a postmodern literary approach than a cinematic one, except for a certain set of films that come to mind that recall pastiche more than a truly cohesive confluence. However, it's one of those things where the individual pieces are (understandably so) at times less than the best of a similar style, and a kid can greedily dream of more. Still, though, if we consider the merging of these styles into a cohesive whole the film's central feature then I think the film represents the best of its type that I have experienced, and some of its individual sequences are so amazing that I would put them up against anything else in cinema. Of course, as I said, this film is completely everything I love in cinema, so it doesn't surprise me that others react somewhat less enthusiastically. But, really, I can't imagine anyone just being indifferent. An intense ambivalence or hatred, perhaps, but indifference? It seems difficult to fathom.

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