Renowned writer-director Davis Simanis (whose Exiled and The Year Before the War have played at previous EUFFs) here offers a powerful historical drama shot in luminous black and white. Based on the true story of Maria Leiko, a famous actress who becomes both a witness to and victim of Stalin’s brutal regime. In 1937, the then former silent film star travels to Russia after learning of the birth of her granddaughter. Discovering the tragic circumstances of her birth, she is persuaded by KGB agents to stay, abandoning her film career to join the Latvian State Theatre in Moscow. Increasingly aware that she is being manipulated by the Soviet government during its ruthless purges of political enemies, she must choose between family and career, and between her artistic ideals and the barbaric politics of Stalinism.