The story of the film begins in 1984, the very beginning of Perestroika in USSR, when a group of architects decided to organize a one night music band as a New Year’s party joke in Kaunas, Lithuania. The joke proved to be so good that rumours about the new exciting rock band Antis spread from lips to lips. Imposing make-up and props, stylized show and lyrics made a pervasive caricature of the Soviet propaganda and perfectly discredited the absurd of the Soviet reality. Soon their intellectual clownery grew into the Rock Marches – massive events involving thousands of people. These transformed into big meetings for Lithuanian Independence later named the Singing Revolution. This is a story about a small country that in a certain period of history managed to overshadow all the other news headlines in the world. This is a story about people who raised their independence with smiles and songs regardless to the danger of the situation. “For me the memories and euphoria when we became independent 20 years ago are as strong as memories of first love. This generation of the 80s is the generation of my parents, architects and friends of Antis’ band. Therefore I feel the subject very personal and close, as I was growing with these underground carnivals and with the feeling of community in an enclosed artists’ territory where the absurd of Soviet reality was held apart. However later I have directly experienced how this feeling of community changed into the alienation that is observed not only in this generation, not only in Lithuania but in the whole present society as well,” says director Giedrė Žickytė.
