The Poll Diaries

June 1914. The 14-year-old Oda von Siering returns from Berlin to her family’s estate “Poll” at the Estonian Baltic coast. Oda arrives in a porous idyll. In the remote province of the Russian czardom, Germans, Russians and Estonians prefer to live segregatedly. Her aristocratic family belongs to the disintegrating remnant of the German community. Her father Ebbo is absorbed by his fanatic research on the human brain, her somnambulistic aunt Milla maintains an affair with the gruff manager of the estate, and Oda is courted by her pitiful Cousin Paul, a young cadet of the Russian army.

In midst of the suffocating environment, the artistically highly gifted Oda encounters the wounded Estonian anarchist and falls passionately in love. She decides to hide and tend the stranger even though she is aware of putting her life and that of her family at risk. The fugitive anarchist embodies the young girl’s dream of a romantic and adventurous life. When the stranger seeks to leave” Poll,” he faces the fervour of that passionate adolescent who would rather break with her entire world before she allows to be torn apart. In the heat of the summer, on the verge of World War I, the conflicts are brewing and drag the characters inexorably towards the line between life and death.

Directed by Chris Kraus

Germany/Austria/Estonia – 2010 – 129 min – 35mm – In German with English subtitles
With Paula Beer (Oda von Siering), Edgar Selge (Oda’s father, Ebbo Von Siering) and Tambet Tuisk (the eastern anarchist)