Ausma

Directed by Laila Pakalniņa (2015), Latvia, Estonia, Poland, 90 min.

The film, which was a Latvian Oscar nominee in 2017, is based on the story of Pavlik Morozov, who, after his death, was made a patron of the pioneer movement and a role model for children in the USSR by Stalinist propaganda. The film's main character is 10-year-old Janis. He is a pioneer and lives in a kolkhoz called Dawn in what is now Latvia. His father is an enemy of the kolkhoz (and the Soviet system) and intends to burn down the head office. Little Janis turns his father in to the militia, for which his father takes revenge by killing the boy.