8 Views of Lake Biwa

The film portrays intertwined tragic love stories between the people of a single rural fishing village. Everybody knows everyone else and each story’s protagonists are supporting characters in the other stories. All ballads are interrupted, only to continue in the next stories.
A devastating accident pushes the surviving inhabitants into a cascade of tragic consequences. Even in a community self-isolating from modern progress, their art and magic are fading. Christian and animistic faith are neglected and rituals harnessed for selfish purposes.
Archetypal characters fluidly change roles between the views, but the teenage girl, Hanake is ever-present: she embodies the central theme of innocence lost and everything abandoned along with it. While we explore playfulness and intimacy across generations, it is crushing grief, ambition and a dogged fatalism that drive events toward a final reckoning with nature itself.

Directors bio
Marko Raat is an award-winning Estonian writer-director, curator and academic, active in the fields of both arthouse fiction film and documentaries since 1999. He has a vast background in theatre directing, TV productions and in fine art. His latest feature length documentary FUNERAL DIARIES (2019) after premiering at Dok.Fest Munich and opening DocPoint Tallinn, is still travelling the festival circuit. His most recent short film A Chairman’s Tale (2015) had its debut at the International Art Exhibition of la Biennale di Venezia. His last feature length fiction film The Snow Queen (2010) had been developed at SOURCES2 and premiered at the Montreal World Film Festival, then was screened at Cairo and Mumbai among many acclaimed festivals.

Producers bio
Producer and Sound Designer Ivo Felt co-founded the production company Allfilm in 1995. Currently Ivo is focusing more on producing but has created sound design for more than 50 feature and documentary films in the past. Ivo´s productions include Zaza Urushadze´s Tangerines (2013) nominated for the Academy Award and Golden Globe as well as Klaus Härö´s The Fencer (2015) nominated for Golden Globe. Ivo´s latest feature Truth and Justice (2019) directed by Tanel Toom broke box office records locally, won a Sattellite Award and was shortlisted for an Academy Award. He is currently in post-production with Tanel Toom’s much anticipated second feature film Sentinel (2023) starring Kate Bosworth and Thomas Kretschmann, co-produced by Germany’s Kick Film. Ivo has produced also a number of creative documentaries and works with director Marko Raat for over twelve years now. Their latest collaboration, Funeral Diaries (2019) opened at DOK.fest Munich screened at many festivals later.

Producers 2 bio
Dora is a Hungarian producer and strategist, with a background in aesthetics and film theory/history, living inTallinn since2020. Her recent projects include a number of short films by Peter Strickland, features by Hungarian found-footage auteurs and academics Péter Lichter andBori Máté and short docs by Texas-based directors Ivete Lucas andPatrick Bresnan. Strickland’s segment in horror anthology The Field Guide to Evil (2018) premiered at SXSW and the team's shorts GUO4 (2019 Venice) and Cold Meridian (2020, San Sebastian) are both still out on the festival circuit. Lichter’s Empty Horses (2019) was at IFFR and Jihlava, and his following (co-directed with Bori Máté) The Philosophy of Horror (2020), screened at Torino andIFFR. Dora has collaborated withLucas andBresnan since 2015 and their latest short doc HAPPINESS IS A JOURNEY (2021) premiered in Locarno. Dora is an EAVEgraduate and her works have been acquired by Mubi and recognised by Sound Magazine's end-of-year lists.

Producion company bio
Founded in 1995, Tallinn based Allfilm’s productions include Zaza Urushadze ́s Tangerines (2013) nominated for the Academy Award and Golden Globe as well as Klaus Härö ́s The Fencer (2015) nominated for Golden Globe. Debut feature Truth and Justice (2019) directed by Tanel Toom broke box office records locally, won a Satellite Award and was shortlisted for an Academy Award. Their latest production, Kalev (2022) premiered in Warsaw and is Estonia's official entry to the Academy Awards.

Producion company 2 bio
Founded in 2007, Helsinki based Bufo has produced such films as Aki Kaurismäki’s Berlinale Silver Bear Winner The Other Side of Hope (2017, co-produced with Sputnik). They have also been involved in a number of international co-productions, for instance Oscar nominee Eskil Vogt’s The Innocents (world premiere in Cannes 2021). Their latest productions include Saara Saarela’s dystopian drama Memory of Water that premiered in September, 2022.