Mari Lill

Mari Lill

Born: December 21, 1945
Mari Lill (born December 21, 1945) is an Estonian stage, film and television actress whose career began onstage in the late 1960s.

Mari Lill was born in Tallinn to Felix Lill and Asta Lill (née Multer) just after the end of World War II and the Soviet occupation and annexation of Estonia. Her father Felix was arrested by Soviet authorities and spent several years sentenced to forced labor in the gulag system in Siberia when she was still an infant. He was later able to return to the family when Mari was quite young. Lill is the middle child of three siblings; she has an older sister Kadri, and her younger brother was glass artist Ivo Lill. Lill grew up and attended schools in the district of Nõmme and spent time visiting her grandmother on the island of Saaremaa.

After graduating from secondary school, Lill studied acting under the supervision of course instructor Voldemar Panso at the Tallinn State Conservatory (now, the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre). Her diploma production was in the role of Helen Keller in a 1967 staging of William Gibson's The Miracle Worker. She graduated in 1968. Among her graduating classmates were actors Helle-Reet Helenurm, Katrin Karisma, Raivo Trass, Enn Klooren, Jaan Tooming, Peeter Jakobi, and Kalju Komissarov.

Movies for Mari Lill...

Alien 2 or: The Return of Valdis in 17 Episodes
Title: Alien 2 or: The Return of Valdis in 17 Episodes
Character: Handbagless Old Lady
Released: April 1, 2024
Type: Movie
Valdis returns after 20 years, his memory restored, but his hometown transformed. Despite the changes, his friends Märt and Ott guide him through rediscovering life's joys.
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Free Money
Title: Free Money
Character: Granny Aino
Released: September 8, 2023
Type: Movie
Where would you look for help if the bank refused your loan application, which you saw as so certain? This is the kind of problem Taavi and Liisa find themselves facing. Would a lottery ticket be helpful, or instead a few thousand Bitcoins that were floating around in your tech box ten years ago? Meanwhile, enthusiastic entrepreneur Maximillion enjoys the attention of his crypto exchange and can't wait for the collapse of classic banking with his beautiful Armani. The head of the pension fund, Erik, however, keeps his sanity and avoids everything digital. After all, only what you understand and grasp is worth investing in. But what do you do when even your 12-year-old son already earns more than you?
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The Monster
Title: The Monster
Character: Old Lady
Released: November 12, 2021
Type: Movie
A story about young Cathy and her conjured up monster with an appetite for people. Fun at first, things take a turn for the worse when the monster’s appetite turns uncontrollable. The film is based on Veiko Belials' short story “The Monster”.
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Firebird
Title: Firebird
Character: Old Lady
Released: October 29, 2021
Type: Movie
At the height of the Cold War, a troubled soldier forms a forbidden love triangle with a daring fighter pilot and his female comrade amid the dangerous surroundings of a Soviet Air Force Base.
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Kratt
Title: Kratt
Character: Grandma
Released: November 13, 2020
Type: Movie
Children are left at grandma's house without their smartphones. Real life seems rather boring until they find instructions for the Kratt - a magical creature who will do whatever its master says. All they have to do now, is to buy a soul from the devil.
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Fire Lily
Title: Fire Lily
Character: Carer
Released: May 11, 2018
Type: Movie
The mystical and thrilling drama asks what sort of reality can give our life meaning. The film tells the story of Pia (38), an ophthalmologist, whose marriage has recently ended because she was not able to have children. As she strives to move forward with her life, Pia learns the unknown but also finds her inner strength. Unexpectedly, her deepest wish to become a mother materializes, but not quite in the way she imagined it.
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Manslayer/Virgin/Shadow
Title: Manslayer/Virgin/Shadow
Character: Kai Savolainen (Virgin)
Released: November 25, 2017
Type: Movie
The film consists of three chapters. The Manslayer takes place more than a hundred years ago. The leading character Maara is a young bride who is about to start her life in her new family. The Virgin, set in the spring of 1949, tells the story of a young woman called Elina, who has been deported from Ingria into Estonia during the previous war. The Shadow moves in the present, on the border of real life and fantasy. The main character, Luna Lee, has decided to flee from home. Is there anything besides emptiness somewhere? The film is led by the singularity of the leading character - Maara, Elina and Luna Lee are all played by the same actress.
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Class Reunion
Title: Class Reunion
Character: Old Lady
Released: February 19, 2016
Type: Movie
Three middle aged men are going to their high school reunion after 25 years and the troubles that come with it.
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The Maggot Feeder
Title: The Maggot Feeder
Character: Spider (voice)
Released: November 1, 2012
Type: Movie
A man decides to kill his wife because she can’t have children. He builds a stone house on the seashore and starts to grow maggots in it. When the maggots are as thick as a wrist, he invites his wife for a walk on the beach…
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Title: Revenge Office
Character: Krista Tuvi
Released: April 30, 2009
Type: TV
A group of women create a organisation named "Kättemaksukontor" to fight for the rights of women and help solve murder mysterys for the police.
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Autumn Ball
Title: Autumn Ball
Character: Cashier #1
Released: September 13, 2007
Type: Movie
Autumn in Estonia, where six people live, six solitudes, prisoners of the monotonous architecture of Soviet-era concrete buildings, in search of human companionship, of love, of a ray of light in an ocean of gray.
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Libarebased ja kooljad
Title: Libarebased ja kooljad
Character: Kupeldaja
Released: June 5, 1998
Type: Movie
Based on the tales of Chinese writer Pu Songling, the film depicts the romantic relationships of a Chinese student with an undead girl and a fox spirit maiden. Rainer Sarnet's diploma film.
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Title: Wikman's Boys
Character: Mrs. Laasik
Released: January 8, 1995
Type: TV
Wikman's Boys is a 1994-year drama serial about the Wikman Private Gymnasium students from 1937 till their mobilization in 1944. The series is based on a 1988 novel Wikmani poisid by Jaan Kross.
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Jüri Rumm
Title: Jüri Rumm
Character: Madam Mihkel
Released: May 26, 1994
Type: Movie
Jüri Rumm is a hot-tempered young peasant who is not afraid of either German barons or the Russian czar, barfights or disobedience to his master's orders. Mari, a gentle peasant girl, loves Jüri despite the fact that he is very popular among young women. Evelin is a quick-tempered baron's daughter who is used to get everything she wants, including a peasant boyfriend who considers himself a free man. Yet, the free man becomes an outlaw. Where will the runaway's love lead him?
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Come Back, Lumumba
Title: Come Back, Lumumba
Released: August 12, 1992
Type: Movie
Aurora, the new head of the culture centre in a small Estonian town, and her ward, nicknamed Lumumba, change the lives of Rein and his father who are crushed with grief. Together with their friend Elsa, the boys decide to introduce Rein's father to Aurora in order to make them feel less lonely.
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Old Man Wants to Go Home
Title: Old Man Wants to Go Home
Character: Maile
Released: December 1, 1991
Type: Movie
Toomas Simmo is a simple worker who has seen a lot of injustice and carelessness in his life. Yet he has not become bitter or lost the ability to understand and encourage other people who are struggling with their problems. When he lies in the hospital with an amputated leg, her daughter presents him with the most difficult choice of his life.
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Ainus pühapäev
Title: Ainus pühapäev
Released: January 1, 1990
Type: Movie
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Stolen Meeting
Title: Stolen Meeting
Character: Asta
Released: June 5, 1989
Type: Movie
A mother released from a prison camp in Russia finds her son, but realises that reconciliation is impossible.
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Games for Teenagers
Title: Games for Teenagers
Character: Robi's Mother
Released: November 28, 1985
Type: Movie
A sensitive girl struggles with first love and bullying in a 1980's Soviet orphanage.
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Ask the Dead About the Price of Death
Title: Ask the Dead About the Price of Death
Character: Anton's Wife
Released: June 8, 1977
Type: Movie
The attempted coup of Estonia on Dec. 1, 1924, conducted by Comintern, staged by the Soviet Communists, failed and resulted in many lost lives on both sides. The Communists were forced underground.
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The Little Witch
Title: The Little Witch
Character: The Little Witch
Released: February 15, 1975
Type: Movie
The little witch is already 127 years old, but that's no age for a real witch! She lives with a nice green crow named Aabram in a tiny hut in a thick forest, which, like all other witches' houses, stands on chicken legs. As you can imagine, she is busy all day to learn all the wisdom of the witches. Anyway, the little witch is quite different from the usual fairy tale witches.