Tag: cinema
Peter von Bagh: Sodankylä ikuisesti [Sodankylä forever]
11 June 2010 | Mini reviews, Reviews
Sodankylä ikuisesti
[Sodankylä forever]
Helsinki: WSOY, 2010. 308 p., ill.
ISBN 978-951-0-36290-7
€ 52, hardback
The Midnight Sun Film Festival is the world’s northernmost film festival. Held in Sodankylä, Lapland, it is now 25 years old. This scrapbook includes the text of speeches given by filmmakers as well as a wealth of material about the films shown over the years. Much of this material is based on the morning discussion panels which the festival’s director, film historian and author Peter von Bagh, has chaired with his guests. More than one hundred film directors, from Samuel Fuller to Wim Wenders, talk about the background and influences in their work. Von Bagh has constructed dialogues between directors who did not actually attend the same sessions; he calls these conversations – sometimes between the living and the dead – ‘heavenly dialogues’. The Festival was founded by Finnish film directors Aki and Mika Kaurismäki and Anssi Mänttäri in collaboration with the municipality of Sodankylä. The light summer nights and laid-back atmosphere at the festival delight the speakers and audience members every year. In the words of the American filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker, ‘Woodstock is fuckin’ nothing if you’ve been at the Midnight Sun Film Festival.’
Sakari Toiviainen: Kadonnutta paratiisia etsimässä [In search of a lost paradise]
12 August 2009 | Mini reviews, Reviews
Kadonnutta paratiisia etsimässä. Markku Lehmuskallion ja Anastasia Lapsuin
elokuvat
[In search of a lost paradise. The films of Lehmuskallio and Anastasia Lapsui]
Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society, 2009. 274 p., ill.
ISBN 978-952-222-067-7
€ 28, paperback
Markku Lehmuskallio (born 1938) is a filmmaker and photographer who since 1973 has made 18 full-length feature films, as well as a number of shorter ones. A half of his work is a collaborative venture with his wife Anastasia Lapsui, who is a native of the Nenets region in Arctic Russia. The main subjects of his films are the relationship between people and nature, and indigenous cultures throughout the northern hemisphere. Lehmuskallio’s early work reflects his activity as a pioneer of the green movement, as his films from that period deal with the environmental threat to the forests. Lehmuskallio has also directed fiction films, including the first to be made in the Nenets language, the award-winning Seven songs from the tundra. He has documented the conflicts between indigenous and national cultures, such as the destruction of the environment of the Siberian peoples in the process of gas and oilfield exploration. The filmographer Sakari Toiviainen had access to original material ranging from brittle old reels of film to diaries; Lehmuskallio’s own voice comes through clearly in the text.
Lauri Timonen: Lähikuvassa Matti Pellonpää [Matti Pellonpää in closeup]
16 July 2009 | Mini reviews, Reviews
Lähikuvassa Matti Pellonpää
[Matti Pellonpää in close-up]
Helsinki: Otava, 2009. 335 p., ill.
ISBN 978-951-1-22903-2
€ 25, hardback
Matti Pellonpää (1951–1995) was one of the trusted actors, almost a trademark, of the film director Aki Kaurismäki. In 1993 he won the Felix Prize for best European male actor at the Berlin Film Festival for his role in La Vie de Bohéme. With his characteristic restrained empathy Pellonpää mostly played bohemians, unemployed people and outcasts. This portrait is built on the recollections of his friends and colleagues, as well as on the interviews by the author. These conversations deal with Pellonpää’s theatrical career and the musical experiments of his highly original band, Peltsix. The actor spent most of his free time in restaurants, where he eavesdropped on table talk and watched the eccentric personalities he encountered; the reader is also offered a sample of Pellonpää anecdotes.