He admitted that during his studies, he wanted to make a movie about violence among students, and when he saw The Elephant he thought, "Van Sant got my film idea."

Like van Sant, Raag was inspired by a real-life event at Columbine High School in the US state of Colorado, but the plot was mostly created during a 10-day workshop where Estonian students told about their own experiences.

"In this way The Class is partly a true story. Apart from the ending that should be a warning what could happen in many schools nowadays," Raag explained.

To him the most interesting was to seek the source of the violence - not giving a simple answer, but trying to explore it with a viewer. "And I have never gotten so many e-mails than after premiere of my film," he said.