A meditation on endurance through enchantment: “November”

Rainer Sarnet’s November (2017) unveils a haunting mythos through the lens of a nineteenth century village community in Estonia. The immutability of folklore threads its way throughout the film, reminding us of the necessity of enchantment as a means to overcome suffering. As spectators, we follow the villagers as they dabble in the forest’s sorcery to seek a means for surviving the winter. The lure lies less in the plot, but more in the beauty of the visuals; true to his style, Sarnet crafts an air of primordial mysticism emitting a charm at once haunting and irresistible.

‘The forest has the eyes, the sea has the ears’ – such are the words of an old Baltic proverb. The world is constantly observing us, our relations with one another and the other creatures who dwell in the natural world. Through folklore tales and proverbial wisdom, the voices of predecessors speak and linger; they remind us of our duty to ourselves and one another, that there exists no boundary between the human world and the natural world. Thus we must hold nature in respect and reverence. November is a film deeply saturated with such themes. 

In the clutches of winter, the folk of a small Estonian village grapple with poverty and hunger. Through their strife, they seek respite through the enchantment of the forest, brimming with riddles and a glimmer of sanctity amid the bleak winter. The film opens upon a kratt, an architectonic jumble of bones and timber animated with a life of its own. This creature appears in many Estonian folktales, where it is known as a treasure-bearer, though dealt with suspicion, for one must take heed of its mischievous tendencies. As the folklore goes, the kratt is constructed by its master from miscellaneous objects found in the household or the forest. To bring it to life, the master must make a deal with the devil, giving him three drops of blood in exchange for a soul. Such threads of mythology and folklore are interwoven within the fabric of the film. 

Focus is then turned to Liina (Rea Lest-Liik), who suffers from unrequited love after falling for Hans (Jörgen Liik), a fellow villager, who in turn only has eyes for another. Both strive in vain to win the hearts of their respective beloveds, yet are met only with the cold and empty embrace of winter as the village’s older generations observe the unravelling of these lovelorn souls. Through the prevailing torments of love, a bridge between old and young, past and present, is formed. The perennial nature of such strife offers its own comfort, silent and imperceptible, yet omnipresent, in the world of humanity and nature alike. Even the local lake recites its own romantic lamentation, in a haunting sequence recalling the tragedy of a past generation of lovers. They, too, suffered at the hands of love, forced apart by circumstance. And nature bore witness to it all. 

The precedence of nature is an integral facet of Estonian folklore. Ancient tales about the world’s origins tell of a tree which forms the centre of the world; everything that constitutes life is locked in orbit around this tree, even the skies, which are nailed there with the North Star. These animistic beliefs, which consistently honour the sanctity of nature, and the presence of a distinct spiritual essence which dwells in all things, are preserved in folklore. This is reflected in the kratt, a figure which, though constructed from seemingly inanimate objects, can nonetheless be brought to life with a spirit of its own. 

The film also shines a light upon the intricacies of faith and picks them apart as the folktale transpires. In the backdrop of the nineteenth century, the farcical nature of Christian piety is unravelled as the village-folk receive their sacrament, before forming a line to spit it back out for the purpose of crafting bullets endowed with a supernatural power, made as they are from the body of Christ. 

Such farcical humour brings a glimmer of light to winter’s grim landscape in this small village community. The strength of the human spirit is bolstered by the grain of faith that persists within. It matters not whether this faith is Christian or Pagan; what remains essential is that the world continues to be sacralised, the relationship between humanity and nature remaining in constant dialogue, constant exchange. There is not one which is superior to the other; the natural world is not there for man to dominate. Rather, it is a source of reverence, a numinous power which must be treated with respect. For perhaps, as  Estonian folklore reveals, you will receive a gift in return for such reverence; that could be the difference between demise and survival amid the harsh tides of winter.