Out of Estonia comes a most perverse and pleasurable story of the former Soviet Union. In the early 1990s, the Estonian Film Archive received a pile of canisters containing long-lost film strips from Eesti Reklaamfilm – the only studio in the USSR that produced commercials. The founder and boss of the successful business enterprise was Peedu Ojamaa, a gifted salesman who started young, selling seedy photos to his school friends. According to Peedu, “Everybody knows that happiness means owning things.” When the Kremlin decided to make commercials in the late ’60s, it seems fitting that such a man got the permit. If the products didn’t exist, or at best didn’t make it to the shelves, what did it matter? The style was borrowed from the West, overlaid with a special Soviet touch (check out the Cosmos marmalade). Kiur Aarma’s documentary, crafted from the Archive’s lost-and-found commercials, is filled with jaw-dropping ads and lines, such as, “If we don’t have the product, at least with have the packaging.” Don’t miss this hilarious and knowing ride through a little-known aspect of Soviet history.

Tickets available here at the Sydney Film Festival Site