TALENT
German Golub
NEW WAVE OF ESTONIAN FILM German Golub (28) won a student film Oscar for his graduation film and was elected to represent Estonia in Future Frames: Generation NEXT of the European Cinema 2021 programme, presented as part of Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.
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By Maria Ulfsak Photo by Virge Viertek
here, ten outstanding film students and graduates from schools throughout Europe take part in a three-day tailor-made pro gramme to further and ease their way into the international film scene with the sup port of extensive press coverage. Apart from present ing and discussing their films with the KVIFF audience, the young professionals also take part in an exclusive masterclass with an internationally renowned filmmak er, and have industry meetings with festival program mers, world sales agents, producers, film funders, and other important industry members. German Golub, a graduate of Baltic Film, Media and Arts School (BFM) in Tallinn, won a Student Acad emy Award (and a gold medal in the International Nar rative film category) with his 34-minute short film My Dear Corpses. It gave him an additional opportunity to compete for a short film Oscar, but the film didn’t make it to the shortlist. My Dear Corpses is practically a nobudget film - the only expense, in the director’s words, was “a lot of blood, sweat and tears, plus 3300 euros”. The events of this tragicomedy are based on the director’s own life. The protagonist is a young man
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Erki (Ruuben-Joosua Palu), who has suddenly become homeless, and has to start taking care of his elderly and lonely mother (Vilma Luik). He has no other op tions but to accept the first job offered – as a corpse carrier. Erki’s new colleague Ott, a boozy cadaver en thusiast with a twisted sense of humour, is a seasoned veteran at this job. German, how has the success of My Dear Corpses and the Student Oscar win influenced your life? Have any new doors opened, or new offers arrived on the table?
The aftereffects of My Dear Corpses start gradually to appear only now. The “first wave” of the win consisted of an unusually high level of attention and, of course, a massive workload. I basically had to take a crash course in the mechanics of the global film industry, how to campaign for a short film academy award, who to speak to, and how, etc. It was (and still is) a proper studying session, for tunately there are a lot of people in Estonia who helped me, and for that I am very grateful. I also participated in the Golden Mentorship pro
