Shorts National Competition 1

PÖFF Shorts 2023

As sure as the Estonian forests are green and the winters harsh yet beautiful – the best Estonian shorts have a certain indefinable magic. It’s always ironic that a nation that can often be (unfairly) maligned for a certain aloofness, can count on fiction, doc, and animation filmmakers with their achingly compassionate, persistently quirky, and defiantly humane shorts.

The 2023 National Competition takes us from birth to death with the usual intricacies of love and conflict, with abstractness in between. The past, present, and future of both Estonia and humanity are all explored as realism, magic, elegant monochrome and a rainbow of colours unfurl before us.

As always, many films emanate from the Baltic Film, Media and Arts School and the Estonian Academy of Arts, allowing the programme to shine a spotlight on young and future talents. But established masters are also here, making for a dizzying array of Estonian on-screen wonder in fiction, animation, and documentary.