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INVENTING ESTONIA

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Great and inspirational film! Inventive minds keep dreams alive! Let your imagination run wild and other people will appreciate your ideas and your gizmos. This short film follows children in Estonia who have a knack for inventing things that relate to their hobbies or passions. Music, in one young girl's case and camping, in one young boy's case. Another boy is very kind-hearted and wants to help people live healthier lives. The girl invents a staff ruler. It's for creating a musical staff on which you can later write musical notes. You cannot do this with a regular ruler. Another invention is a cocoon mattress. It eliminates need for a suitcase, heavy backpack or mattress when going camping. A third inventor creates a health glove for managing both epilepsy and cold temperatures. The filmmaker is quite accomplished and this production exemplifies her excellent filmmaking skills. The sets are very pleasing to the eye. Aerial views show lots of green fields, trees and fishing ponds. I particularly love the excellent close-up photography of bees pollinating some pink flowers. There's also a really nice emphasis on nature and natural wonders. These are all good inspirations for invention! Another beautiful close-up is of a very ornate accordion that a woman is playing. There are interesting views of her grandmother's old house in need of repair, including some unusual objects hanging on the outside walls. Perhaps they are some old inventions created by her grandmother or other elders. I noticed a recurring blue and white animated computer graphic of some sort of motorized mechanical device. It seems to be the visual theme or some sort of logo for this film. Perhaps this is some kind of graphical design software that's available to people in Estonia. The cinematography of the flowing rivers and the bustling city streets (where the boy likes to folkdance) captures the viewer's attention. One boy doesn't want to patent his invention. He is very unselfish in that he wants to allow anybody to produce these cocoon mattresses. This boy suggests keeping an invention notebook, to write down or draw all of one's inventions. My favorite part is hearing how happy these children are living in their country. There is a lot of national pride and appreciation for everything their homeland offers them. The message is to figure out what you really enjoy doing in life and then create some new object to make that even better for yourself and other people. Inspiring! I give this film 5 out of 5 stars and recommend it for ages 8 to 16. Reviewed by Jeff M., KIDS FIRST! Adult Juror.

Inventing Estonia. There are nice documentary stories about fantastic children's inventions. Leen Bumeister (10) is created staff ruler. Erik Maidla (10) did a cocoon mattress and Aap Petrov (11) built glove for health control. We see the views of Estonia from the point of view of flying birds Tallinn, middle Estonia Märjamaa and South Estonia Võõpsu village