Estonians have always been waiting for the white ship but it never came. Sulev Keedus in holding a mirror up to the society and one sees that there are people who are desperate.
This is working class life in Saaremaa. Some of them drink; most of them have spent their life working without finding any meaning. Others have lost their family, or are losing it slowly day-by-day. Still others are losing their sanity. Some go to get treatment for drinking but they rarely feel any hope.
The film is divided into multiple parts by the name of the main character. Each has their own problems but one woman stands out in particular. For me she’s the only one who can make an emotional connection.
She says you clean; you wash clothes; you bring firewood; and prepare dinner. That’s what you do all day and that’s all that life is really about.
First her child died of meningitis, and then she had three more. She dreams of her own house – a beautiful yellow house. She wants to the forest to live alone. Don’t want to be here in the village – “I’ve always said I don’t want to be here”. Would have some chickens, a cow. Now she has dreamy eyes. The village corrupts her, she says, it has made her drink. She doesn’t want to talk about it. “I can never forget my child,” is all she can say.
In the village there are feelings of inferiority complex.
When the village county fair held in Mustjala there is a quest star – a singer introduced as Jonathan from Australia.
