The Temptation of St. Tony

OFFICIAL SELECTION – SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL

Tony, a middle-aged, midlevel manager, leads a quiet life. But one day, he starts to question the value of being good. In a series of bizarre encounters in which he fires his employees, witnesses his wife’s infidelity, and meets a soon-to-be kidnapped girl (never mind the severed hands and mystery dog), Tony gradually becomes unhinged from reality.

Õunpuu’s second feature asks, what good is goodness when all it brings is loss? He gleefully supplants our sense of narrative context with avant-garde flourishes, wryly devised vignettes, and unfolding metaphors, stranding us in poor Tony’s forest dark. Provocative and evasive, the film infuses chaotic energy and emotional tension into its elegant black-and-white imagery. Õunpuu’s stark vision feels more like a dream (or nightmare) and recalls the beauty of being oblique.

"Director Õunpuu gleefully supplants our sense of narrative context with avant-garde flourishes, wryly devised vignettes, and unfolding metaphors...Provocative and evasive, the film infuses chaotic energy and emotional tension into its elegant black-and-white imagery. Õunpuu¹s stark vision feels more like a dream (or nightmare) and recalls the beauty of being oblique."
-INDIEWIRE

"Temptation of St. Tony, a Tallinn yuppie's midlife crisis as hallucinatory odyssey of faith in a world gone to exhausted decadence and cannibalism, done with a kicky, surreal sense of humor. The black-and-silver photography is like fine-edged engraving; Õunpuu is one of the few directors featured who seems to take making a film as an "Astonisme" challenge, arthouse in a throwback way." - The Village Voice

“Bizarre and beautiful, disturbing and droll.” (Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times)