The Little Comrade
In the midst of Stalinist tyranny, six-year-old Leelo’s mother is sent to a prison camp. Leelo vows to be on her best behaviour in the confusing grown-up world in the hope that it will bring her mother back.
It is 1950 in the Soviet Estonia and the Stalinist terror machine works at full steam – 6-year-old Leelo’s school principal mother is arrested before her very eyes. ‘If you’re a good kid, I’ll be back soon,’ are her mother’s last words as she is taken away at gunpoint.
So Leelo is on her very best behaviour, but yet her mother does not return. A fear creeps into the child’s soul that it is her fault her mother was taken. The confusion only grows as ‘good’ and ‘bad’ no longer seem to hold any meaning in these troubled times. Why is the Estonian flag suddenly forbidden? Who is the people’s enemy?
In this odd two-faced world, Leelo tries her best to be good, but is instead embroiled in one scrape after another and becomes ever more confused as to what it even means to be a good kid.