Synopsis

Eastern Europe, in the new century. It’s the law of the jungle with a wolfish appetite. There are still a few people who are looking for the withered Tree of Knowledge to find out about good and evil, even if they are just planning to make good office furniture out of it. The Temptation of St. Tony is a film about a man named Tõnu, middle-aged and stuck in the very darkening forest that Dante Alighieri described in Inferno. An unusual problem intrudes on his reasonably prosperous and peaceful life: morality. Is it possible to be a “good person”? And what does that mean anyway? On his journey to a clearer consciousness, but an increasingly complicated reality, Tõnu meets several typical representatives of the current Estonian society. He experiences exciting adventures that are not without humor. But it gradually seems that the man, inevitably loses his job, his family, and finally the reality itself. Compassion is associated with heavy losses. Veiko Õunpuu’s unusual and weird black and white film was a discovery at numerous festivals and was officially nominated in Estonia in the category Best Foreign Language Film for the 83rd Academy Awards in 2011.