A group of Estonian women sit naked in a pitch-dark sauna for hours and talk about the stuff people usually spend a lifetime trying not to say out loud.
Thanks to Tyler Cowen of Marginal Revolution for surfacing this one after he spotted it on The Guardian’s list.
Trailer for “Smoke Sauna Sisterhood”
You Can’t Make This Sh!t Up
- The women spend hours completely naked in a tiny, nearly pitch-black room while telling stories about rape, sexual abuse, cancer, stillbirth and other experiences they have carried for years.
- A traditional smoke sauna has no chimney. Smoke from the wood fire fills the room during heating. It is aired out before people enter, but the walls and ceiling stay black with soot.
- Some sessions can stretch for hours. Director Anna Hints and her crew had to figure out how to film inside a cramped, extremely hot sauna while protecting their equipment and keeping the women comfortable enough to forget about the camera.
Watch “Smoke Sauna Sisterhood”
You can find the latest streaming options for “Smoke Sauna Sisterhood” on Prime Video, Apple TV and other services through JustWatch.
Ratings:
- My Rating: 95/100
- IMDB Rating: 7.1/10
- Rotten Tomatoes Ratings: 78/100 (Users); 96/100 (Critics)
Director’s Note: Anna Hints directed and wrote this 89-minute Estonian documentary. She puts us inside the sauna with the women. Faces are often hidden by darkness, steam or tight framing, which makes their voices and stories the focus.
Release Date: 2023
Other Unique Stuff
- The doc’s original Estonian title is “Savvusanna sõsarad.”
- UNESCO added the smoke-sauna tradition in Võromaa to its Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2014.
- Director Anna Hints grew up around smoke-sauna culture. That personal connection helps explain why the sauna isn’t treated as an exotic backdrop. It’s simply where these conversations belong.
Wrap Up:
“Smoke Sauna Sisterhood” is basically 89 minutes of women sitting in the dark and talking. Some of those stories are hard to shake.
Thanks for reading!
Heather Fenty, Guest Writer, Daily Doc