THE LAND OF LOVE
Liivo Niglas | Sibiria, Estonia 2016 | 78 Min. | OmeU
The Land of Love is a documentary film about reindeer, oil, politics and poetry. It tells a story about Yuri Vella, a Forest Nenets reindeer herder and poet who lives in the taiga of Western Siberia, and who tries to prove that one person can stand against the great power that is destroying the environment of the native people.
Vella calls the Land of Love a piece of the forest tundra where each autumn his reindeer mate. The same area is a favoured hunting ground for employees of Lukoil, a company that pumps oil in the region. For many years already, Yuri has tried to chase the Lukoil people away from the Land of Love because the noise of cars and rifle shots and the ruckus caused by boozing oil workers disturbs the mating of reindeer. Yuri uses several unusual resistance methods to chase the oil workers away, including filming the intruders and writing poems on the subject.
