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Sunrise

"Päikesetõus" ("Sunrise") delves into the depths of the human soul, where traditional notions of good and evil dissolve into the infinite diversity of subjective perception. The film tells the story of a young girl, Iris, who grew up in a 20th-century Estonian Christian family. Driven by a thirst for love and a longing for material beauty, she commits a minor crime that becomes the catalyst for an internal struggle and a reevaluation of her former moral principles. This act inevitably leads to a profound conflict: as she reflects on everything she knew about Christianity, God, and morality, a question arises… What place do her desires hold within the dogmatic frameworks she once accepted?
The second important character, a boy named Knut, grew up in a troubled family under the tyranny of a cruel father. Yet, despite retaining love for his mother, he is tormented by emotions accumulated from years of endured brutality. Upon encountering Iris’s impoverished family, he finds a way to release his anger…

  • Artur Talpsepp
    Director
  • Artur Talpsepp
    Writer
  • Artur Talpsepp
    Producer
  • Mirtel Kõue Gamzejev
    Key Cast
    "Iris"
  • Enton Berendsen
    Key Cast
    "Knut"
  • Artur Viks
    Key Cast
    "Henri"
  • Annika Gorelova
    Key Cast
    "Linda"
  • Ronan Malinkin
    Key Cast
    "Franz"
  • Gertrud Kohtring
    Key Cast
    "Lydia"
  • Kati Jägel-Paal
    Key Cast
    "Joanna"
  • Rene Kundla
    Key Cast
    "Jakob"
  • Dmitri Sirenko
    Key Cast
    "Knut (Young)"
  • Project Title (Original Language):
    Päikesetõus
  • Project Type:
    Short
  • Runtime:
    43 minutes 11 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    May 17, 2024
  • Country of Origin:
    Estonia
  • Country of Filming:
    Estonia
  • Language:
    Estonian
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    Yes
  • Student Project:
    Yes - Kohtla-Järve Gümnaasium
Director Biography - Artur Talpsepp

Date of Birth: October 30, 2005
Place of Birth: Estonia
Education: Studying at Kohtla-Järve Gymnasium, specializing in "Theater, Film, and Television".

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Director Statement

When I was making this film, I wanted to pour my entire inner world into it.

As a child, I was a devout boy. Faith was so strongly imposed on me by my parents that even after receiving a bad grade in school, I could kneel before the window asking God for forgiveness. At some point, I began to see a problem with the moral rules "postulated by God." When I was about 11, I stopped believing in God and often pondered the difficulty of defining objective good and evil, as these concepts are created by humans and their meaning depends on each person's unique experience and perspective. Over time, these thoughts led me to various conclusions that changed my world: all people are subjective because they simply cannot step outside their own boundaries and view the world through someone else's perspective. Literally, we cannot see the world through someone else's eyes, so how can we know if the world we see is real? If all our judgments stem from our subjective experience and senses. Because of this, I began to think that all people are egocentric because if we cannot step outside our own boundaries, we cannot understand another person. When we think we understand others' feelings, for example, we are merely comparing our own experience to the described experience of another person. Developing these thoughts for my film, I began to think that total subjectivity creates a problem in defining good and evil, truth and lies, and the entire world in general.

All these emotions, experiences, and thoughts I put into this film. It is a small excursion into my inner world. People are amazing due to their minds, because if everything is subjective to us, then the world has no meaning. But there is meaning in people's inner worlds. We give meaning to an otherwise meaningless world, lighting a torch in complete darkness. Humans are the light, and so I made the characters in a way that each has their own truth and their own meanings in this meaningless world. I made the characters completely live in their total subjectivity, elevating it. Thus, in the film, there is no conflict between a protagonist and an antagonist. There are two protagonists, and the conflicts occur within their minds between their established dogmas and their desires, lust, and egocentrism.

With this film, I want to show where a person's beliefs lead, illustrating this through the example of religion. How a person is egocentric by nature and how objective morality does not exist. I don't know if I managed to convey these thoughts in this film, but the attempt had a profound impact on me, and I grew through this film. I hope it can inspire someone to new thoughts, to create art, or give motivation to other aspiring filmmakers like me to make films because cinema is a great art! It encompasses other art forms, creating something special, something that can change someone's life and add light to it...