Directed by Leida Laius • 1988 • USSR/Estonia

The final film from the great Leida Laius, A Stolen Meeting is a vivid and heartfelt take on rootlessness, reconciliation, and motherhood at the end of the Soviet era. On her release from a Russian prison, Valentina (Maria Klenskaja) returns to her native Estonia in search of her son, given up for adoption years before. As she struggles to adapt to life on the outside, she is brought closer and closer to the reunion that she both desires and fears. A fitting final chapter in Laius’s career of bringing tenacious and complex female characters to the Soviet screen and an empathetic portrait of a woman on the edge of a society in decline.

A STOLEN MEETING • VARASTATUD KOHTUMINE
Directed by Leida Laius
Written by Maria Zverjeva
Cinematography by Jüri Sillart
Music by Lepo Sumera
Starring: Maria Klenskaja, Andreas Kangur, Sulev Luik

In Estonian with English subtitles