Sign Painter (2020)

This Latvian historical drama, which triumphed at Jewish film festivals of the 2020-2021 season, revolves around Ansis, a talented painter who is making a living painting street signs and wants to marry the daughter of a Jewish salesman — but the epoch-making changes will, of course, prevent his dream from coming true. This film shares an unexpected perspective on the systemic antisemitism that was quietly emerging in Europe from the very periphery of the Old World, where things were developing in the same direction as everywhere else, but at a later point in time and in different ways than in other countries. The story unfolds in a remote village, which will all the same be occupied and forever changed by the inevitable and heavy historical upheavals, alongside the country, the entire world, and Ansis’s heart.