Non stuzzicate la Zanzara / Don't Sting the Mosquito (Olaf Möller Masterclass, Sodankylä 2026) Olaf Möller /

Lina Wertmüller: Non stuzzicate la Zanzara / Don't Sting the Mosquito (IT 1967) with Giulietta Masina (Maria Cristina, Rita's mother), Rita Pavone (Rita Santangelo) and Giancarlo Giannini (Paolo Randi, Rita's boyfriend).

Lina Wertmüller: Non stuzzicate la Zanzara / Don't Sting the Mosquito (IT 1967) with Rita Pavone (Rita Santangelo) and Giulietta Masina (Maria Cristina, Rita's mother).

IT 1967. PC: Mondial Televisione Film • P: Sergio Bonotti, Gilberto Carbone. D+SC: Lina Wertmüller. DP: Dario Di Palma - colour: Technostampa - scope • ED: Franco Fraticelli • PD: Enrico Job • Cost: Enrico Job • S: Giulio Tagliacozzo • M: Bruno Canfora • Song lyrics co-writer: Lina Wertmüller • C: Rita Pavone, Giancarlo Giannini, Raffaele Pisu, Giulietta Masina •  loc: Rome • Copy from: Titanus, RAI • DCP • in Italian • subtitled in English • announced duration: 124 min - screening duration 90 min

    Sodankylän Elokuvajuhlat / Midnight Sun Film Festival (MSFF) 2026: Olaf Möller Masterclass: 60’s musicals – The Way We Once Danced Through the Days

    Olaf Möller Masterclass

    Iso Teltta, 14 June 2026

AA: Rita Pavone, "the Mosquito of Turin" ("la Zanzara di Torino"), also known as "the Carrot Top ("Pel di Carota") because of her red hair, starred in two movies directed by Lina Wertmüller. Here the co-stars include Giulietta Masina from the great tradition of Italian theatre and cinema and Giancarlo Giannini who got his first leading roles in the Zanzara movies. I confess I did not recognize Giannini here!

Michelangelo Antonioni had just shot Blow Up in London, but Rita Pavone and Lina Wertmüller brought the Mod attitude and Carnaby Street fashion of Swinging London to Rome. 

It is a musicarelli, a pop film, openly influenced by Richard Lester's Beatles movies, but with a defiantly original attitude. This goofiness is all-Italian.

I like Rita Pavone as a singer. This was still the time when great singers sang with full scope and presence, not only in Italy but worldwide. Rita Pavone was popular in Finland, too, and our counterpart, Katri Helena, did a great Finnish-language cover of her hit "Lui".

Pavone mostly sings Italian originals but also includes a couple of fine covers, including "Gimme Some Lovin", the 1966 hit by The Spencer Davis Group. "Bye Bye Baby" from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is also on the songlist, but it is not among the highlights.

There is a Finnish word, "unelmahöttöä" (coined by Erkki Tuomioja) meaning the "cotton candy", "zucchero filato" of daydreams, and this is the world of Zanzara, indulging in fantasy while making fun of it. This is the teenage world between childhood and adulthood.

Wes Anderson might like this movie.

This is the world of the musical comedy, taking place in the Neverland between dream and reality. It is superficial and profound at once. La vida es sueño. "We are such stuff that dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep".

Pavone & Wertmüller navigate confidently in this special zone. They have an instinctive sense in the flight of the imagination, the space of the musical flow and the riptide of emotions. 

In light entertainment mode, Don't Sting the Mosquito is also a rebel saga, the young daughter claiming independence with swashbuckler derring-do. More specifically, it is a saga of female agency, the daughter even becoming a role model for her tradwife mother.

The extended blackface sequence is offensive and embarrassing. Rita Pavone needs a disguise, but there could have been better alternatives.

All sources give the duration of 124 minutes, but this screening ran 90 minutes. The digital restoration is perfect, and the audacious colour scheme with lots of oranges and violets has been beautifully preserved.

I have a special affection for film directors as songwriters in their own movies, like Lina Wertmüller here.

SONG LIST

La Zanzara (main theme)

La Svizzera  (co-lyr. Lina Wertmüller)

Una notte intera (co-lyr. Lina Wertmüller)

Tu guardi lei  (co-lyr. Lina Wertmüller)

Cuore

Plip

Scimmia

Perchè due non fa tre

Non è un peccato

Ma che te ne importa se va

Solo tu

Garage Beat!

Gira gira

Questo nostro amore  (co-lyr. Lina Wertmüller)

La canzone

[In the end credits, 16 songs are credited, but the names flashed by too fast for me to write them down].

Olaf Möller (MSFF 2026): "This is most decidedly not the kind of film folks on average would expect from Lina Wertmüller: a straightforward exercise in popular cinema. She made four of them inbetween her frivolously Fellinian debut The Basilisks (1963) and her true international breakthrough as an autrice, The Seduction of Mimi (1972): a commedia all’italiana omnibus, two musicarelli and a western – all being straightforward entertainments as well as parodies of their respective genres."

"Considering her penchant for judiciously dosed histrionics and a sense for the grotesque at heart of all that life we call real, it feels fitting that she should show a curious excellence at doing musicals. Set in good parts in an academy for Swiss Guards, Don’t Sting the Mosquito perplexes among other things with a minimalist song-and-dance number featuring papal soldiers-in-the-making singing “Switzerland!” while wiggling in synch with their halberds (after an earlier joke about turning battle banners into diapers), a delirious number in split-screen, a bonkers low-key hop-around in wild west drag, and an overall use of mauve that leaves even LSD-savvy viewers in a state of daze. For all the love and admiration Lina Wertmüller is more than due: if only she had made just a few more movies like Don’t Sting the Mosquito…!" Olaf Möller

Olaf Möller (MSFF 2026): "Tämä ei ole filmi, jollaista ihmiset Lina Wertmülleriltä odottaisivat: Don’t Sting the Mosquito on suoraviivainen populaarielokuva. Hän teki sellaisia neljä huolettoman felliniläisen debyyttinsä I basilischin (1963) ja varsinaisen kansainvälisen auteur-läpimurtonsa Mafian uhrin (1972) välisenä aikana: yhden commedia all’italiana -elokuvan, kaksi musicarellia ja yhden westernin – jotka kaikki ovat samanaikaisesti suoraviivaisia viihde-elokuvia ja omien lajityyppiensä parodioita."

"Ottaen huomioon Wertmüllerin taipumuksen harkiten annosteltuun teatraalisuuteen sekä hänen ymmärryksensä kaiken todelliseksi kutsumamme elämän sydämessä olevasta groteskiudesta, tuntuu sopivalta, että hän osoittautuu erinomaiseksi musikaalien tekijäksi. Suurilta osin sveitsiläiskaartin akatemiaan sijoittuva Don’t Sting the Mosquito hämmentää muun muassa minimalistisella laulu- ja tanssiesityksellä, jossa tulevat paavin sotamiehet laulavat “Sveitsi!” ketkutellen tahdissa hilpariensa kanssa, houreisella split screen -numerolla, sekopäisellä hypähtelyllä villin lännen dragissa ja yltäkylläisellä violetin värin käytöllä, joka saisi LSD-kokeneenkin katsojan pyörälle päästään. Vaikka kaikki Lina Wertmüllerille suotu rakkaus ja ihailu on enemmän kuin ansaittua: kunpa hän olisi tehnyt vain muutaman tällaisen elokuvan lisää!" Olaf Möller

Sodankylä 2026: Discussion with Finnish film-makers / Kotimaisten tekijävieraiden keskustelutilaisuus

The discussion with Finnish film-makers at Kitisen Keidas. Left to right: Yasmin Najjar, Pia Andell, Tommi Korpela, Mark Lwoff (at the mike), Liselott Forsman (moderator), Aleksi Salmenperä, Jukka Kärkkäinen, Marko Talli. Arja Saijonmaa came later since the screening of Herr Puntila och hans dräng Matti (FI/SE 1979), in which she stars, was delayed.

The irrepressible Arja Saijonmaa incited us to a cultural revolution. In 30 years, the virtual world of the internet has turned us to sleepwalkers. It is time to wake up.

Discussion with Finnish film-makers. Hosted by Liselott Forsman. Left to right: Yasmin Najjar, Pia Andell, Tommi Korpela, Mark Lwoff, Aleksi Salmenperä, Jukka Kärkkäinen, Marko Talli, Arja Saijonmaa.

    Sodankylän Elokuvajuhlat / Midnight Sun Film Festival (MSFF) 2026. 60 min

    Kitisen Keidas, 13 June 2026

Kotimaisten elokuvantekijöiden keskustelu: ”Taiteilijalla pitää olla selkäranka” / "An artist must have a backbone". (Motto by Arja Saijonmaa).

MSFF: "Mikä tekee elokuvasta merkityksellisen? Sodankylän 2026 suomalaisten elokuvien teemoja ovat ihmisen syvemmät arvot, taiteen tekemisen syyt sekä maailma, jota ei kannata menettää. Keskiössä ovat perhe-, terapia-, kaveri- ja taideyhteisöt sekä eräs orava."

"Paneelissa ovat mukana Aleksi Salmenperä (Isänpäivä), Tommi Korpela (Isänpäivä, Terapia, Ei pilata juhlia puhumalla kuolemasta), Pia Andell (Ei pilata juhlia puhumalla kuolemasta), Jukka Kärkkäinen (Kappale kauneinta Suomea), Yasmin Najjar (TJ28), Mark Lwoff (Orava) sekä Arja Saijonmaa ja Marko Talli, joiden dokumentti (Laula minulle Arja) saa ensi-iltansa Sodankylässä ja josta otsikon sitaatti tulee."

"Keskustelua vetää totuttuun tapaan Liselott Forsman (Nordisk Film & TV Fond)."

AA: The discussion with Finnish film-makers is always my favourite event at the Sodankylä film festival. Brilliantly hosted by Liselott Forsman, I liked the scope and dramaturgy from the youngest (Yasmin Najjar) to the most experienced (Arja Saijonmaa). We are facing multiple existential crises in the cinema and the world, but with talent like this we can beat anything.

Laula minulle Arja / Sing for Me Arja (in person: Arja Saijonmaa and Marko Talli)

Marko Talli: Laula minulle Arja / Sing for Me Arja (FI 2026). Arja Saijonmaa.

Marko Talli: Laula minulle Arja / Sing for Me Arja (FI 2026). Mikis Theodorakis and Arja Saijonmaa.

Arja Saijonmaa: Laulu vapaudelle: muistelmani (Finnish translation by Sirpa Hietanen, WSOY 2025) / En sång för frihet (Swedish original, Ekerlids förlag, 2024) / [A Song for Freedom: My Memoirs]. "The song will carry us while the world is trembling. The scintillating autobiography of a firebrand artist. Arja Saijonmaa has sung with Mikhail Gorbachev, gone through adventures in the jungles of Central America, visited Yasser Arafat at his desert bunker and risen to an iconic singing star in Finland, Sweden and Norway. She has met with success but also suffered severe setbacks on her career and in her personal life." (From the WSOY publicity blurb).

Sjung för mig Arja.

    FI 2026. PC: Yellow Film & TV, Mantaray Film • P+D: Marko Talli • SC: Marko Talli, Nigge Bagge • DP: Jani Kumpulainen • ED: Nigge Bagge • S: Juha Hakanen • M: Matti Bye • Copy: Yellow Film & TV • DCP • in Finnish, Swedish, English, French, Greek • DCP with Finnish and Swedish subtitles * screening subtitled in English • 98 min

    Sodankylän Elokuvajuhlat / Midnight Sun Film Festival (MSFF) 2026, Sodankylä.

    In person: Arja Saijonmaa and Marko Talli, hosted by Liselott Forsman.

    Viewed at the Punainen Teltta, 12 June 2026.

AA: Sing for Me Arja is my favourite film of the year so far. Why? Because it is a movie about the power of the spirit. It is about the essence of culture in a moment when it is endangered by budget cuts, self-censorship and IT oligarchs. Thirty years ago the internet was a force of good but now it is turning into an instance of distraction. In an age when some pretend that the human mind can be outsourced, we need more culture than before.

Culture is our superpower, and it can change the world. The life of Arja Saijonmaa is evidence of this, from the volcanic debut in Lapualaisooppera ([The Lapua Opera], 1966) to this day. 

Marko Talli's candid documentary follows the rise of Saijonmaa to a global solidarity fighter for freedom and democracy in Greece and Chile and an international goodwill ambassador collaborating with luminaries from Pablo Neruda to Harry Belafonte.

Saijonmaa started in Finland but was not a prophet in her own land. In her native Mikkeli the local Lotta ladies selling muikku (vendace) delicacies deserted the market square when Saijonmaa arrived. Kaj Chydenius, the composer and conductor genius, discovered Arja: "tämä ääni ei mahdu tähän huoneeseen" ["this room is not big enough for her voice"]. In a disgraceful detour, Chydenius at a later point became a political hack applying mafia boss approaches to the one who did not toe his party line. Arja chose a sky bigger than his.

Saijonmaa had been passionate about Mikis Theodorakis since the 1960s, and when he was released from prison, Arja welcomed him in Helsinki in November 1970 by singing "These Trees" in Finnish at the Old Student House, and the deeply moved Mikis sang the same song back to her in Greek.

Such was the beginning of a lifelong friendship and professional collaboration. Ever since the question has been: was it also a love affair? Mikis referred to the two Greek words for love: eros and agape. Their affair was agape.

From Saijonmaa's private life we learn about her devotion to swimming and the sauna. We also learn that she was not able to have children because she had had to have her uterus removed. The world became her home.

The most poignant sequence is about an Israeli-Palestinian solidarity campaign in the context of the Oslo Accords. A children's camp of 150 Israeli and Palestinian children was arranged in Oslo, fifty-fifty of both, the children playing and singing together. Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat visited their concert and during the intermission signed an important successor agreement. As we know, Rabin was assassinated in 1992 by an Israeli extremist.

The film concludes with Arja's last encounter and her last reminiscences of Mikis. There was a time when Theodorakis wanted to visit her sauna in the countryside, and Arja asked him to wait by the lake at dusk, because from beyond a cape a black swan would appear, like the one that inspired Sibelius for The Swan of Tuonela [the land of death].

Watching Sing for Me Arja a day after the EPiC Elvis Presley in Concert sing-along event, I was reminiscing about the first time I saw Arja Saijonmaa. I was too young to visit the reportedly volcanic Lapualaisooppera in 1966. But I experienced a bolt of lightning in one of Saijonmaa's cabaret shows at the legendary Student Theatre in 1971. The cabaret started with Elvis Presley's "Jailhouse Rock" played back from a record. Elvis met his match in Arja with her voice capable of electrifying the biggest stages. I was thinking about the mythic battle in Kalevala of two Finnish shamans, Väinämöinen and Joukahainen, who try to sing each other to the swamp.

In this year's repertory of new Finnish releases, Sing for Me Arja seems to occupy a position similar to what The Helsinki Effect was last year. Both are great national films with an international resonance.

Topi E. Timonen (MSFF 2026): "Ohjaaja Marko Tallin uusin dokumenttielokuva avaa yleisölle ainutlaatuisen ikkunan sinivalkoisen kansallisaarteen Arja Saijonmaan (s. 1944) monivivahteiseen, yksinkertaistavia määritelmiä karttavaan taiteilijaelämään. Kuljemme Saijonmaan matkassa halki tämän synnyinmaan kohti kansainvälisiä estradeja ja todistamme taiteilijan, joka on yhtä lailla kotonaan tavallisen kansan kuin Ruotsin kuninkaallisten seurassa. Mikkelistä lähtöisin oleva maailmankansalainen on uransa mittaan tehnyt itsestään länsinaapurin kuuluisimman suomalaisen, ja elämä on kuljettanut häntä myös Pariisiin ja Kreikkaan."

"Dokumentin keskiössä on Saijonmaan vuosikymmeniä jatkunut, kupruilevan kiinnostava ystävyys ja ammatillinen yhteistyö kreikkalaisen Míkis Theodorákisin (1925–2021) kanssa. Saijonmaa on popularisoinut hänen laulujaan Suomessa ja maailmalla."

"Ohjaaja Talli – joka toimitti yleisölle aikaisemmin puhuttelevan henkilökuvan koomikko Jope Ruonansuusta – lähestyy Saijonmaan genrerajoja uhmannutta uraa kronologisen sijasta pikemminkin spiraalisesti. Kierroksien kertyessä kattavan arkistomateriaalin värittämä dokumentti kasvattaa ymmärrystämme Saijonmaasta kotimaansa kulttuurilähettiläänä. Samalla todistamme suomalaisen kulttuurituotannon kutkuttavia kehityskaaria 60-luvulta nykypäivään." Topi E. Timonen

Topi E. Timonen (MSFF 2026): "Director Marko Talli’s latest documentary offers the audience a unique window into the multifaceted life of Arja Saijonmaa (b. 1944), a Finnish national treasure whose artistic career defies simple definition. We follow Saijonmaa’s journey across her native land toward international stages, witnessing an artist who is equally at home among ordinary folk as she is in the company of Swedish royalty. A global citizen originally from Mikkeli, she has made a name for herself as the most famous Finn in Sweden over the course of her career, and life has also taken her to Paris and Greece."

"At the heart of the documentary is Saijonmaa’s decades-long, fascinatingly turbulent friendship and professional collaboration with the Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis (1925–2021). Saijonmaa has popularised his songs in Finland and around the world."

"Director Talli—who previously delivered a poignant portrait of comedian Jope Ruonansuu—approaches Saijonmaa’s genre-defying career in a spiral-like fashion rather than chronologically. As the story unfolds, the documentary, enriched by extensive archival material, deepens our understanding of Saijonmaa as a cultural ambassador for her home country. At the same time, we witness the intriguing evolution of Finnish cultural production from the 1960s to the present day." Topi E. Timonen

...

TRACK LISTING from Yellow Film & TV:

Mustan tuskan romanssi

Salaisella rannalla (Suojaisen poukaman hiekalla)

Don't Cry for (Modern) Greece

Zorba Suite – orkesterisoolo

Margarita Margaro

Enkelten kortteli

Liehu, punalippu, liehu!

Me emme tee mitä emme tahdo

Alhaalta ylöspäin pyydetään (Kerjäläinen)

Varshavjanka (Riistäjät ruoskaansa selkäämme soittaa)

Ystävän laulu

Vanhat tiet

Brevet / Epistolu

Poika on altapäin

Afta ta dendra (Nämä puut)

Oloi dipsane

Paris canaille

Vassilepses asteri mou

Antonio Torres Heredia

Algunas Bestias

Ma solitude

Niin monilla lehdillä

Jag vill tacka livet

Belägringstillståndet

Högt över havet

Surabaya Johnny

Tango Desiree

Jag står i regnet

Tiyende pamodzi

La fiesta de la Tirana

Mannen jag älskar

Zaman el salaam

Våren önskar

Try to Remember

Vad du än trodde så trodde du fel

Yannis Ritsos: These Trees / Afta ta dendra (a poem)

 

Arja Saijonmaa sings These Trees (lyr. Yannis Ritsos, comp. Mikis Theodorakis) for Mikis Theodorakis in Helsinki at the Old Student House in November 1970. Theodorakis had just been released from the Greek military junta prison. Mikis is the second from left in the first row. At the grand piano: Eero Ojanen. My screenshot from YouTube: Arja Saijonmaa and Mikis Theodorakis by HussoHilda 20.1.2010. Copyright Yle the Finnish Broadcasting Corporation. The most remarkable document I know in the history of the cinema of two world class artists seeing each other for the first time. Extraordinary.

YANNIS RITSOS: THESE TREES

From the first canto of Romiosini (Athens 1945–1947)

in Greek, English and Finnish

Γιάννης Ρίτσος

Ρομιοσύνη  

I.

Αὐτὰ τὰ δέντρα δὲ βολεύονται μὲ λιγότερο οὐρανό,

αὐτὲς οἱ πέτρες δὲ βολεύονται κάτου ἀπ᾿ τὰ ξένα βήματα,

αὐτὰ τὰ πρόσωπα δὲ βολεύονται παρὰ μόνο στὸν ἥλιο,

αὐτὲς οἱ καρδιὲς δὲ βολεύονται παρὰ μόνο στὸ δίκιο.

Ἐτοῦτο τὸ τοπίο εἶναι σκληρὸ σὰν τὴ σιωπή,

σφίγγει στὸν κόρφο του τὰ πυρωμένα του λιθάρια,

σφίγγει στὸ φῶς τὶς ὀρφανὲς ἐλιές του καὶ τ᾿ ἀμπέλια του,

σφίγγει τὰ δόντια. Δὲν ὑπάρχει νερό. Μονάχα φῶς.

Ὁ δρόμος χάνεται στὸ φῶς κι ὁ ἴσκιος τῆς μάντρας εἶναι σίδερο.

Μαρμάρωσαν τὰ δέντρα, τὰ ποτάμια κ᾿ οἱ φωνὲς μὲς στὸν ἀσβέστη τοῦ ἥλιου.

Ἡ ρίζα σκοντάφτει στὸ μάρμαρο. Τὰ σκονισμένα σκοίνα.

Τὸ μουλάρι κι ὁ βράχος. Λαχανιάζουν. Δὲν ὑπάρχει νερό.

Ὅλοι διψᾶνε. Χρόνια τώρα. Ὅλοι μασᾶνε μία μπουκιὰ οὐρανὸ πάνου ἀπ᾿ τὴν πίκρα τους.

Τὰ μάτια τους εἶναι κόκκινα ἀπ᾿ τὴν ἀγρύπνια,

μία βαθειὰ χαρακιὰ σφηνωμένη ἀνάμεσα στὰ φρύδια τους

σὰν ἕνα κυπαρίσσι ἀνάμεσα σὲ δυὸ βουνὰ τὸ λιόγερμα.

THESE TREES

These trees cannot fit 

in less sky

These stones cannot sit 

under foreign steps

These faces cannot be content 

except in the sun

These hearts cannot be content 

except in justice.

This place is 

as harsh as silence

It squeezes into its bosom

its scorched rocks

It strangles its orphan olive trees

and its vineyards in the light

It gnashes its teeth

There is no water. Only light

The road is lost in the light

and the shade of the stone hedge is steel

(Opening lines of the literal translation by Catherine Nina Evarkiou)

NÄMÄ PUUT

Nämä puut eivät sopeudu

pienemmän taivaan alle

Nämä kalliot eivät sovi

vieraiden askelten alle

Nämä kasvot eivät sopeudu

muualle kuin aurinkoon

Nämä sydämet eivät taivu

kuin oikeuden edessä

Tämä maisema on totta

kuin hiljaisuus

Se kätkee sisäänsä

tulisia, tulisia kiviä

Se sulkee valoon

oliivipuut ja viinitarhat

Tämä vettä ei ole

on vain valoa

My transcription from the song performance by Arja Saijonmaa to Mikis Theodorakis in Helsinki, November 1970.

The Greek original and the literal English translation by Catherine Nina Evarkiou from: Alchemy: A Journal of Translation. Alchemy the Journal © 2021 All Rights Reserved

Sing-along: EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert (2026 Sodankylä Iso Teltta) sing-along leader: Marjo Leinonen

Baz Luhrmann: EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert (AU/US 2025).

Sing-along: EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert (2026 Sodankylä Iso Teltta). Hosted by Juhana von Bagh. Front row left: sing-along leader Marjo Leinonen. Front row middle: Antti Alanen and Laila Alanen.

AU/US 2025. PC: Authentic Studios, Bazmark Films • P: Baz Luhrmann, Jeremy Castro, Matthew Gross, Colin Smeeton, Schuyler Weiss. D: Baz Luhrmann. ED: Jonathan Redmond • S: Wayne Pashley • Copy: Finnkino • DCP • in English • sing-along subtitles in English • 96 min

    Track listing: see below.

    Helsinki premiere: 27 Feb 2026

    Sodankylän Elokuvajuhlat / Midnight Sun Film Festival (MSFF) 2026

    Sing-along event. Sing-along leader: Marjo Leinonen.

    Iso Teltta, 11 June 2026.

EPiC = Elvis Presley in Concert.

Kaisu Tervonen (MSFF 2026): "The hips of Elvis are still well worth talking about. Blending concert footage with documentary, Epic sees the virtuoso performer gyrate with such intensity that the audience’s sciatica twinges as their defences dissolve."

"When Australian director Baz Luhrmann was making his swinging biopic Elvis (2022), he combed through both unseen and familiar footage, eventually turning to two previous concert films: Elvis: That’s the Way It Is (1970) and Elvis on Tour (1972). Unused footage was also discovered, which Luhrmann restored for Epic. He utilised technology from the studio of New Zealand filmmaker Peter Jackson, who had previously used it for his three-part Beatles documentary Get Back (2021)."

"The result is dazzling both visually and aurally. Luhrmann spends the first half hour flashing his rapid-fire editing style to recap Elvis’s life, but the remainder of the movie is all about the hips, “Hound Dog”, big-band arrangements, “Burning Love”, the intimacy of the rehearsal room, “In the Ghetto” and a closing medley. The recordings are seen and heard with a clarity whose power is undeniable: whatever Elvis Presley was offstage, on stage he truly was the King. The crowd in the karaoke tent is his court for this performance." Kaisu Tervonen

Kaisu Tervonen (MSFF 2026): "Elviksen lanteista on syytä puhua edelleen. Konserttielokuvan ja dokumentin yhdistävässä Epicissä armoitettu esiintyjä vatkaa lanteitaan niin, että katsoja tuntee iskiaksensa ärtyvän mutta vastarintansa murenevan."

"Kun australialaisohjaaja Baz Luhrmann teki svengaavaa elämäkertaelokuvaansa Elvis (2022), hän kolusi läpi ennennäkemätöntä ja jo nähtyä materiaalia ja päätyi kahden aiemman konserttielokuvan ääreen: Elvis: That’s the Way It Is (1970) ja Elvis on Tour (1972). Niistä löytyi myös käyttämätöntä materiaalia, jonka Luhrmann restauroi Epiciä varten. Apunaan hänellä oli uusiseelantilaisohjaaja Peter Jacksonin studion teknologia, jota Jackson käytti myös kolmeosaisessa Beatles-dokumentissaan Get Back (2021)."

"Jälki häikäisee niin visuaalisesti kuin auraalisesti. Kun ensimmäisen puolen tunnin ajan Luhrmann näyttää sähäkkää editointityyliään kerratessaan Elviksen elämänkaarta, elokuvan loppuosa täyttyy lanteista, ”Hound Dogista”, ison orkesterin soundista, ”Burning Lovesta”, harjoitusten välittömästä tunnelmasta, ”In the Ghettosta” ja lopusta biisikimarasta. Taltioinnit nähdään ja kuullaan tarkkuudella, jonka todistusvoimaa ei voi kiistää: mitä tahansa Elvis Presley oli lavan ulkopuolella, lavalla hän tosiaan oli kuningas. Karaoketeltan yleisö on hänen tämänkertainen hovinsa." Kaisu Tervonen

AA: I considered Baz Luhrmann's Elvis (AU/US 2022) the best Elvis movie I had seen and also the greatest achievement of Baz Luhrmann as a director.

Luhrmann's first Elvis movie was a fictional biopic, Austin Butler playing the part so well. EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert is a compilation documentary. It is also great, and completely different. For sing-along purposes it is slightly too fragmentary. Even when songs are played in extenso, they are cut with inserts.

But we all had a great time in the biggest circus tent of Finland, led by the rhythm & blues veteran Marjo Leinonen.

EPiC is a non-fiction biopic based on authentic documents and little known interviews with the entertainer himself. This is a contemporary view. We don't need or want varnish or polish. We can face the harrowing aspects of excess and abuse. Also the garish lack of taste.

Through this his soul goes marching on, fuelled by his biggest love affairs: first with his mother, and then with his audience. He gives all, wins all and loses all. In the purgatory of multiple addictions he never loses his ability to give a great performance. He loves to sing. A born musician.

The track list covers the major periods out of chronology: the Sun years with "That's All Right (Mama)" and "Blue Moon", further early hits like "Love Me" and "Hound Dog", US Army years with "Are You Lonesome Tonight?", gospels like "How Great Thou Art" and "Oh Happy Day", civil rights in "In the Ghetto" and "Walk a Mile in My Shoes", heartfelt covers of contemporary hits ("You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'" "A Bridge Over Troubled Water", "Something"), psychedelic surprises ("A Change of Reality") and the late confessions "Always On My Mind" and "Suspicious Minds".

Singing along I was thinking about Marilyn Monroe, a contemporary, whose centenary we celebrated last week. Both were stars of a new generation with a frank, optimistic and life-affirming attitude, defying 1950s repression, in tune with the New Frontier. Sex symbols maybe, but neither saw themselves that way. Both were All-American and embracing civil rights ideals.

More deeply integrated than before I felt the role of spirituals in the Elvis songbook. He was more than the sum of his contradictions, and the clash of the sacred and the profane may have been the most profound among those contradictions. The Swedish "How Great Thou Art" ("O Store Gud", 1885) is one of the most popular hymns worldwide, and Elvis's passionate gospel interpretation is the best. He is not crushed but elevated by its power.

EPiC is the best non-fiction portrait I know of Presley as a human being, his genuine affection in encounters with fellow musicians, family, friends, fans and the media. Electrified by the audience, in an authentic interaction. At home on the stage, big or small. Every time experiencing stage fright. Aware of his flaws, and transcending them. Living in an increasing haze of mind-altering drugs and gradually perishing by them.

TRACK LISTING FROM WIKIPEDIA (incomplete)

No. / Title / Artist(s) / Length

1. "Can't Help Falling in Love" (EPiC intro) / Presley / 0:21

2. "Also sprach Zarathustra / An American Trilogy" (EPiC version) / Presley • Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / 1:49

3. "That's All Right" (EPiC version) / Presley / 2:02

4. "Tiger Man" (EPiC version) / Presley / 1:41

5. "Wearin' That Night Life Look" / Presley • Jamieson Shaw / 3:12

6. "Hound Dog" (EPiC version) / Presley / 1:20

7. "Polk Salad Annie" (EPiC version) / Presley / 5:43

8. "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'" (EPiC version) / Presley / 4:21

9. "Little Sister / Get Back" (EPiC version) / Presley / 3:04

10. "Burning Love" (EPiC version) / Presley • Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / 3:22

11. "Never Been to Spain" (EPiC version) / Presley / 2:15

12. "Love Me" (Jamieson Shaw remix) / Presley • Shaw / 3:49

13. "I Can't Stop Loving You" (EPiC version) / Presley / 2:13

14. "Are You Lonesome Tonight?" (EPiC version) / Presley / 1:47

15. "Always on My Mind" (EPiC version) / Presley / 2:30

16. "How Great Thou Art" (EPiC version) / Presley / 2:51

17. "Oh Happy Day" (EPiC version) / Presley • Shaw / 3:11

18. "A Big Hunk o' Love" (EPiC version) / Presley / 2:06

19. "Bridge over Troubled Water" (EPiC version) / Presley / 4:14

20. "In the Ghetto" (Jamieson Shaw remix) / Presley • Shaw / 4:09

21. "Walk a Mile in My Shoes" (EPiC version) / Presley / 2:00

22. "Suspicious Minds" (EPiC version) / Presley / 4:50

23. "Bring the Curtain Down" (EPiC outro) / Presley / 1:10

24. "Can't Help Falling in Love" (EPiC version) / Presley / 1:56

25. "American David" (EPiC version) / Bono • Elliott Wheeler / 0:48

26. "A Change of Reality (Do You Miss Me?)" / Presley • Shaw / 3:10

27. "Don't Fly Away" (Pnau remix) / Presley • Pnau / 4:08

Der Traum von Lieschen Müller / The Dream of Lieschen Mueller (Olaf Möller Masterclass, Sodankylä 2026)

Helmut Käutner: Der Traum von Lieschen Müller / The Dream of Lieschen Mueller (DE 1961). Sonja Ziemann (Lieschen Müller), Helmut Griem (Jan).

Federal Republic of Germany © 1961 Gloria Film Munich • PC: Divina-Film • P: Ilse Kubaschewski, Georg Richter • D: Helmut Käutner •  SC: Willibald Eser, Helmut Käutner • Cin: Günther Senftleben –  VistaVision [according to Filmportal] – Omnimago [according to the DCP credits] • ED: Klaus Dudenhöfer • PD: Hertha Hareiter, Otto Pischinger • Cost: Margot Schönberger • S: Clemens Tütsch • M: Michel Legrand • Lyrics: Helmut Käutner, Willibald Eser • C: Sonja Ziemann, Martin Held, Cornelia Froboess, Helmut Griem, Peter Weck •  Print: Beta Film • DCP • in German • subtitles: English • 89 min

    Note: prominent in the movie is a huge billboard for a "Brigitte Bardot movie" called Ein Hemd steht leer [A Shirt Remains Empty]. No such film exists.

    Sodankylän Elokuvajuhlat / Midnight Sun Film Festival (MSFF) 2026 / Olaf Möller Masterclass, subtitles in English.

    Viewed at The School, 10 June 2026

Olaf Möller (MSFF 2026): "Lieschen Müller on länsisaksalaisen tavanomaisuuden perikuva: hän asuu mitäänsanomattomassa pienessä tuppukylässä, orpona ja naimattomana, pankin palveluksessa, vakioasiakkaana samassa lounaskahvilassa… Eräänä päivänä ilmaantuu muuan tri Schmidt ja esittää viehättävälle nuorelle neidolle tarjouksen: hän kutsuu tämän mukaansa maailmanmatkalle, liikeasioilla. Lieschen kieltäytyy kainosti, mutta kun hän nukahtaa toimistossaan ylitöiden uuvuttamana, elokuva muuttuu mustavalkoisesta värilliseksi, ja varhaisen länsisaksalaisen elokuvan jumala Helmut Käutner antaa palaa – seuraa yhtä laulua ja tanssia huikentelevissa lavasteissa kerrotussa paksussa tarinassa, joka sen kun paksunee joka perforaatioaukolla. Rahaa kuin roskaa! Maailman ympäri! Talousihmemaasta taivaaseen martineilla ja havaijinleivillä!"

"Käutner onnistuu sekä säästämään että syömään kakkunsa, sillä The Dream of Lieschen Mueller on yhtä suuressa määrin satiiria 1950-luvun Länsi-Saksan unelmista ja harhakuvista kuin oman aikansa hyväntuulisen ja loisteliaan elokuvan nec plus ultra. Toisin kuin monet kriitikot, Käutner uskoi, että yleisöä voi ilahduttaa samalla kun sille kertoo vähemmän imartelevia, ellei jopa levottomuutta herättäviä asioita. Tässä mielessä The Dream of Lieschen Mueller on esteettiseltä kannalta yhä aikaansa edellä." Olaf Möller

Olaf Möller (MSFF 2026): "Lieschen Müller is the epitome of FRG ordinariness: She lives in small, nondescript Dingskirchen, is an orphan and single, employed by a bank, a regular at lunch in the same diner… you get the drift. One day, a Dr. Schmidt appears and makes the charming young lady an offer: he invites her to travel the world with him, on business. Lieschen demurely declines, but when she falls asleep in the of. ice, tired from doing overtime… the film turns from black and white to colour, and early FRG cinema god Helmut Käutner lets it rip – all singing, all dancing, in extravagant sets made for a tall tale turning taller and taller by the sprocket hole. Big money! The whole wide world! Wirtschaftswunderland sky high on Martini and Toast Hawaii!"

"Being Käutner, the master has his cake and gets to eat it too, as The Dream of Lieschen Mueller is as much a satire of the dreams and delusions of the FRG in the 50s as it is a nec plus ultra of the era’s cinema in all its feel-good splendour. In contrast to many a critic, Käutner believed that you can delight an audience while telling it a lot of not-so-flattering, even disturbing things. In that sense, The Dream of Lieschen Mueller is aesthetically speaking still ahead of its time…" Olaf Möller

AA: In a musical, form becomes substance. A piece of escapist entertainment made of flimsy material transforms into a self-reflective metafilm about Sein und Schein / être et paraître / being and appearance.

Olaf Möller, the magician of discovering unknown treasures hiding in plain sight, compares The Dream of Lieschen Mueller with another major Helmut Käutner film from the same year, Black Gravel, a tough and merciless exposé of life under the age of reconstruction after WWII. The dreamland of Lieschen Mueller is in contrast to the realism of Black Gravel, but both describe the same condition: the spiritual void in the years of the Wirtschaftswunder.

The cheesy special effects of Lieschen Müller do not achieve the charm of The Wizard of Oz (which might be an inspiration) but resonate with Pop Art and anticipate the Music Television of the 1980s, Kenny Everett, David Mallet and Weird Al Yankovich. Failing to inspire awe, Käutner succeeds in parody and fun.

Helmut Käutner and Lieschen Müller celebrate the ideals of success, materialism and consumerism at face value like Frank Tashlin and Jerry Lewis, yet in the end those ideals turn into a laughing matter.

Käutner was a master of the cabaret film and also a master of humanism, even in the years of Nazi Europe in his "three film wonder" starting with Romanze in Moll celebrated by Henri Langlois. The same unfaltering dignity we find in the heart of Lieschen Müller, defying the cynicism of the brave new mercenary world.

...

I have a fondness for film directors writing their own song lyrics, like Helmut Käutner here.

TJ28 / 28 Days Left

 

Yasmin Najjar: TJ28 / 28 Days Left (FI 2026). Featuring Yasmin Najjar.

FI 2026. PC: Aalto University, ELO Film School • P: Meri-Tuuli Varis • D: Yasmin Najjar • SC: Kasperi Riihimäki • DP: Nadia Farghaly • ED: Julia Matinniemi • PD: Sonia Gran • Cost: Satu Muurinen, Iiris Jämsén • S: Laura Torkkola • M: Laura Torkkola • C: Yasmin Najjar, Okko Alanne, Sherwan Haji, Mohamed El-Waber, Leevi Pellas • Copy from: Aalto University, ELO Film School • DCP • in Finnish and Arabic • subtitles in English • 24 min

    Sodankylän Elokuvajuhlat / Midnight Sun Film Festival (MSFF) 2026: Kotimaisia lyhytelokuvaensi-iltoja 2

    Viewed at Iso Teltta, 10 June 2026

Liina Härkönen (MSFF 2026): "Sodankylän elokuvajuhlilla on usein ollut ilo esittää Cannesin toukokuisten elokuvajuhlien Suomi-edustusta tuoreeltaan valkokankaalta. Niin nytkin, kun saamme nähtäville Yasmin Najjarin ohjaaman ja tähdittämän, militarismia ja diasporaa osuvasti peilaavan lyhytdraaman TJ28, joka valittiin tuhansien tarjokkaiden joukosta Cannesin La Cinef -sarjaan."

"Ohjaajan omiin armeijakokemuksiin perustuvassa elokuvassa Amani (Najjar) on vapaaehtoisen palvelusaikansa loppusuoralla saadessaan huolestuttavia uutisia isoisänsä kotiseudulta Gazasta. Amani yrittää keskittyä käsillä olevaan tehtävään, mutta armeijatoverien paikoin huoleton suhtautuminen taisteluharjoituksiin ja kanssaelollisiin kirpaisee pakostakin eri tavalla, kun läheinen on kaukana pahimman keskellä."

"Ohjaajan omat lapsuusajan kotivideot yhdistettynä Nadia Farghalyn upeaan metsäkuvaukseen tuovat asian kipeän ytimen lähelle vailla turhaa herutusta. Kun Aallosta tulee Suomen elokuva-alalle tällaisia maistereita, niin on synti ja häpeä, jos rahoitusta ei löydy." Liina Härkönen

Liina Härkönen (MSFF 2026): "Midnight Sun Film Festival has often had the pleasure of freshly presenting Finland’s representatives at the Cannes Film Festival on our silver screen. This is also the case now, as we get to see the short drama 28 Days Left, directed by and starring Yasmin Najjar. This poignant reflection of militarism and diaspora was selected to Cannes’ La Cinef competition out of thousands of submissions."

"Based on the director’s own experiences in the Finnish army, Amani (Najjar) is nearing the end of her voluntary service, when she receives worrying news about her grandfather in Gaza. Amani keeps trying to focus on the task at hand, but the mainly cavalier attitudes of her squad mates towards combat exercise and other living beings hit home differently when a loved one is far away facing the worst."

"The director’s own childhood home videos combined with Nadia Farghaly’s stunning forest cinematography bring the painful point home without unnecessary pathos. When the Aalto University’s Department of Film is providing such fresh talent to our film industry, it is a crying shame if we can’t get them funding."

AA: I saw Yasmin Najjar's 28 Days Left in the Aalto ELO Film School Spring Show 2026 Program II and was impressed. On second viewing, it is even more impressive.

The defense of Finland is based on national military service for all adult males. Service can be military or civilian. For females, service is voluntary.

TJ is military slang, meaning "tännehän jäätte" / "here you will remain". TJ28 means "28 days left". Thus we are in the final instruction period of the conscripts. In the middle of the final combat exercise.

Najjar's movie is a study in tensions, conveying a meaningful experience in "the fog of war". Night has fallen. Infrared devices are in use. There is confusion because an unidentified creature is glimpsed in the shooting range. The exercise is interrupted. Indeed, in the morning it turns out that a deer has become a casualty. 

The exercise is of a supposedly disciplined unit, but everyone is still just an undisciplined individual. Some don't take war games seriously and refuse to fully join the play. Yet the issues are serious. Live ammunition is a matter of life and death. A deer is killed, and the casualty could have been a human.

The conscripts are taking early steps in learning responsibility. Some are learning callousness, even imitating the notorious Abu Ghraib selfie pose with the carcass of the deer. The most conscientious soldier is bullied and harassed, even brutalized.

I feel alienated from the dialogue, with its mongrel "English" hodgepodge. I know that some young people now speak such a language which sounds in my ears like a poor parody.

Mobile devices are ubiquitous during the combat exercise. I understand the epochal turn in digital warfare in Ukraine, where a smaller nation has achieved a formidable might in resistance against the brutal bigger bully with an ingenious use of unmanned armed vehicles.

But here mobile devices seem to be for entertainment. On the battlefield one would expect 100% focus on the situation on the ground instead of drifting to virtual worlds of the internet.

Military life has changed a lot in a generation. Finland by now is multicultural, and women are becoming equal. The technology is very different.

The protagonist is a Finnish-Palestinian woman, completing her voluntary military service in the medical corps. During the exercise she has to deal with explosive tensions in her unit. That same night she learns that her beloved grandfather has been killed in a missile strike into a hospital in Gaza. She keeps calm until she cannot help bursting into tears.

Picnic – In Light Invisible to the Human Eye

 

Jan Ijäs:  Picnic – In Light Invisible to the Human Eye (FI 2026). Location 4: Nahal Oz Observers Memorial Monument. Dedicated to the female observer soldiers who were killed in the Battle of Nahal Oz during the 7 October attacks in 2023. "The best place to observe Gaza".

FI 2026. PC: Atalante Oy • P: Jan Ijäs • DP: Jan Ijäs, Ville Piippo - infrared - scope • ED: Jan Ijäs • S: Svante Colérus • M: Timo Kaukolampi • Copy from: Kinokki • DCP • in English • Finnish subtitles • 26 min

    Location 1: Kobe Hill. Location 2: Zikim Beach, Delila Beach. Location 3: Netiv HaAsara. Location 4: Nahal Oz Observers Memorial Monument.

    Sodankylän Elokuvajuhlat / Midnight Sun Film Festival (MSFF) 2026: Kotimaisia lyhäriensi-iltoja 2

    Viewed at Iso Teltta, 10 June 2026

Liina Härkönen (MSFF 2026): "Mitä jos sotiemme muistomerkeillä tehtäisiin yhä aktiivisesti surmatöitä turistien katsellessa? Tämä on todellisuutta Israelin ja Gazan rajalla."

"Palkittu elokuvataiteilija Jan Ijäs tunnetaan muun muassa Waste-sarjastaan, joka syventyi kunnianhimoisesti jätteen käsitteeseen eri kanteilta. Picnicissä Ijäs jatkaa kantaaottavan tarkkailevalla linjalla tarttuen tällä kertaa Gazan kansanmurhaan. Syyskuussa 2025 kuvatussa materiaalissa käydään rajaseudulla sijaitsevilla matkailukohteilla ja näköalapaikoilla, joille turistit retkeilevät ihailemaan Gazan maisemia. Kertojaääni kertaa matkalaisten aivan oikeasti nettiin jättämiä arvosteluja."

"Infrapunaherkälle filmille kuvatuissa maisemissa sodan kauhut nähdään vain etäisinä savupilvinä, mutta ihmissielun irvokkuus tulee sitäkin näkyvämmin selväksi, kun etuoikeutetut turistit valittavat haju- ja meluhaitoista, joita toiseutetun kansan kohtalo heidän piknik-kokemukselleen tuottaa. Timo Kaukolammen musiikki kruunaa hyytävän vaikutelman." Liina Härkönen

Liina Härkönen (MSFF 2026): "Imagine if our Finnish war memorials were still sites of active killing while tourists watched? This is the reality along the Israel-Gaza border."

"Award-winning filmmaker Jan Ijäs is known for his Waste film series, ambitiously tackling the concept of refuse from various angles. In Picnic, Ijäs continues on a politically observant mode, this time focusing on the genocide in Gaza. In footage shot in September 2025, we visit tourist destinations and look-out points located in the border region, where people travel to marvel at the view overlooking Gaza. The narrator recounts real-life online reviews by the travellers."

"Shot on IR-sensitive film, the horrors of war are but distant puffs of smoke on the horizon. Still, the grotesqueness of the human condition becomes all the more evident by the privileged tourists complaining about such things as noise or smells emanating from the plight of the otherized people, impacting their picnic. The score by Timo Kaukolampi completes the bone-chilling atmosphere." Liina Härkönen

AA: Jan Ijäs's Picnic is The Zone of Interest Part II. I believe Jonathan Glazer would agree with this characterization.

Tourists arrive on sight-seeing tours to witness mass murder on the other side from designated observation points and relax on a paradise beach by the border wall of Gaza. They update their online accounts and travel sites. They only complain of unpleasant noises and smells and minor imperfections in sanitation.

The film is based on their written records. Evidence for Nuremberg Part II.

Recently I have seen several topical movies about the Middle East, all from the Palestinian viewpoint, none criticizing Hamas, Hizbollah or the Islamic Government of Iran. Next I would welcome a series of such movies for balance.

Liian sininen taivas / Too Blue a Sky

 

Risto-Pekka Blom: Liian sininen taivas / Too Blue a Sky (FI 2026).

FI 2026. P+D+SC+DP+ED: Risto-Pekka Blom. S: Arttu Hokkanen • Narrator: Karoliina Vanne • Copy: AV-Arkki • DCP • narrated in Finnish • subtitles in English • 16 min

    Sodankylän Elokuvajuhlat / Midnight Sun Film Festival (MSFF) 2026: Kotimaisia lyhäriensi-iltoja 2

    Viewed at Iso Teltta, 10 June 2026

Liina Härkönen (MSFF 2026): "Risto-Pekka Blomin Suomessa ja kansainvälisestikin palkittuja lyhytelokuvia on nähty Sodankylässä useina vuosina sekä lyhytelokuvanäytöksissä että sunnuntain Leffaraadissa. Elokuvissaan Blom tarkastelee usein vähäeleisen humoristisella otteella näennäisen pienimuotoisista lähtökohdista universaaleiksi kasvavia allegorioita."

"Tässä elokuvassa keskiössä on 164 vuoden ikään ehtivä raakku, jonka elämänkaaren aikana ehtii tapahtua suuria, ihmiskunnan kannalta mullistavia asioita. Diktatuurien syntymät ja kuolemat tai huhutut maailmanloput eivät heilauta sen rauhaisaa eloa Hukkajoen pinnan alla, kunnes ihmisen ahneus koituu kohtalokkaaksi."

"Onko elämä vähemmän arvokasta, jos se ei piittaa ihmiskunnan vouhotuksista? Ja mitä maapallolle jää, kun sitä huolettomasti riistävät ja tuhoavat miljardöörit ovat haudassa? Liian sininen taivas toi ohjaajalleen maaliskuussa jo kolmannen pääpalkinnon Tampereen elokuvajuhlien kotimaisen kilpailun alle 30-minuuttisten elokuvien sarjassa." Liina Härkönen

Liina Härkönen (MSFF 2026): "Risto-Pekka Blom’s award-winning short films have been screened at several editions of the Midnight Sun Film Festival, both in our short film screenings and Sunday’s Leffaraati (Short Film Jury). In his films, Blom often takes a discreetly humorous look at seemingly minor subjects that grow into more universal allegories."

"Too Blue a Sky focuses on a 164-year-old freshwater pearl mussel, whose lifespan covers several events considered revolutionary to humankind. The emergence and collapse of dictatorships and rumours of apocalypse do little to sway the mussel’s peaceful existence in their home river, until the greed of humans finally proves fatal."

"Is life unaffected by human follies any less valuable? And what is left on our Earth, when the billionaires nonchalantly exploiting and destroying it are in their graves? Too Blue a Sky won its director the Main Prize in Tampere Film Festival National Competition’s under 30-minute category, already his third." (Liina Härkönen)

AA: Risto-Pekka Blom's award-winning Too Blue a Sky is a first person narrative from the viewpoint of a 164 year old river pearl mussel. An extraordinary concept but increasingly relevant in contemporary art. Eija-Liisa Ahtila has consistently pursued a view wider than the regular human-centric one. So does Ildiko Enyedi in Stille Freundin / Silent Friend, featuring a gingko tree. One of the all time greatest Finnish books is Puukansan tarina (1984) by Veikko Huovinen, a novel whose protagonist is an old forest. Risto-Pekka Blom's vision is the widest possible: global, universal, devastating, apocalyptic. He creates a mega-montage focusing on Earth Overshoot Days, turning points of Finnish history, the conquest of space, the rise of Vladimir Putin and the rape of Finnish forests, including our pearl mussel speaking in a feminine voice.

Sodankylän Elokuvajuhlat / 41th Midnight Sun Film Festival (2026) lineup

 

Sodankylän Elokuvajuhlat / 41th Midnight Sun Film Festival (2026) catalogue. Cover art: Victor Seastrom / Victor Sjöström: He Who Gets Slapped (US 1924) with John Gilbert (Bezano, circus rider), Norma Shearer (Consuelo, circus rider) and Lon Chaney (HE / He Who Gets Slapped, a clown / Paul Beaumont, scientist).

THE 2026 LINEUP:

À BRAS-LE-CORPS / SILENT REBELLION

AFTER EGO

AUTRE MONDE, UN / ANOTHER WORLD

AUTUMN LEAVES (c.m. 2025)

BAMAKO / THE COURT

BLUE HERON

BOY GEORGE & CULTURE CLUB

BROKEN ENGLISH

BÜCHSE DER PANDORA, DIE / PANDORA'S BOX / PANDORAN LIPAS

CALIFÓRNIA

CHERCHEZ L’IDOLE / FIND THE IDOL

CONVERSATION, THE / KESKUSTELU

DATNA ÈCLAT (c.m. 2025)

DESPERATELY SEEKING SUSAN / MISSÄ OLET, SUSAN?

DIFERENTE

E (Anna Eriksson 2025)

EGYEDEM-BEGYEDEM / ONE TWO THREE (c.m. Dóra Keresztes 2005)

EI PILATA JUHLIA PUHUMALLA KUOLEMASTA

ELLA JA KAVERIT: OPERAATIO SAUKKO / ELLA AND FRIENDS: OPERATION OTTER

EPIC: ELVIS PRESLEY IN CONCERT

ES GILT DAS GESPROCHENE WORT / I WAS, I AM, I WILL BE

EVERYBODY DIGS BILL EVANS

FOREVER… FOREVER (c.m. 2026)

FUGLAR (OG MENN) / AMONGST THE BIRDS

GELBE BRIEFE / YELLOW LETTERS

HÁN YÈ DĒNG ZHÙ / LIGHT PILLAR

HE WHO GETS SLAPPED / HÄN JOKA SAA KORVAPUUSTIT

HEREMAKONO / WAITING FOR HAPPINESS

HERR PUNTILA OCH HANS DRÄNG MATTI / HERRA PUNTILA JA HÄNEN RENKINSÄ MATTI

HOARDER, THE (c.m. Evelyn Lambart 1969)

HORS-SAISON / OUT OF SEASON

ISABEL

ISÄNPÄIVÄ / FATHER’S DAY

IT’S NEVER OVER, JEFF BUCKLEY

JE NE SUIS PAS LÀ POUR ÊTRE AIMÉ / NOT HERE TO BE LOVED / EI MINUA KUKAAN RAKASTA

JOSSAIN ON VALO JOKA EI SAMMU / A LIGHT THAT NEVER GOES OUT

KALEVALA: KULLERVON TARINA / KALEVALA: THE STORY OF KULLERVO

KANAL – KIROTTUJEN TIE

KAPPALE KAUNEINTA SUOMEA / THE BEAUTY OF ERRORS

KAUNIS RIETAS ONNELLINEN / HAPPY SASSY BEAUTIFUL

KID, THE / CHAPLININ POIKA

KILLING, THE / PELI ON MENETETTY

KOHAYAGAWA-KE NO AKI / THE END OF SUMMER / PERHETARINA

KOLME VIISASTA MIESTÄ / THREE WISE MEN

KRÓTKI FILM O MILOSCI / LYHYT ELOKUVA RAKKAUDESTA

LA POINTE COURTE

LATE FAME

LAULA MINULLE, ARJA / SING FOR ME, ARJA

LE HAVRE

LEHRERZIMMER, DAS / TEACHER’S LOUNGE / OPETTAJAINHUONE

LIIAN SININEN TAIVAS / TOO BLUE A SKY

LOI DU MARCHÉ, LA / THE MEASURE OF A MAN

LONG DAY CLOSES, THE / PÄIVÄ PAINUU MAILLEEN

MAD BILLS TO PAY (OR DESTINY, DILE QUE NO SOY MALO)

MAKING MR. RIGHT / TÄYDELLINEN KAVERI

MASTERMIND, THE

MER INTÉRIEURE (c.m. Giulia Grossmann 2024)

MINIRUSETTI (c.m. Anneli Nygren 1978)

MIROIRS NO. 3 / MIRRORS NO. 3

MY FATHER’S SHADOW

NAISKOHTALOITA

NARCISO

NINA ROZA

NON STUZZICATE LA ZANZARA / DON’T STING THE MOSQUITO

NUIT CHÉRIE /  SWEET NIGHT (c.m. Lia Bertels, 2019)

NYTOSHKA TA KOSHENYA / THREAD AND THE KITTEN (c.m. Valentina Kostyleva, 1974)

OBJET D’ENIGME (c.m. Chiara Caterina 2025)

ORAVA / SQUIRREL, THE

OZU DIARIES, THE

PETITE DERNIERÈ, LA / THE LITTLE SISTER / KUOPUS

PICNIC – IN LIGHT INVISIBLE TO THE HUMAN EYE

PLACEHOLDER (c.m. Teemu Nikki 2026)

PORTO

PRÉNOM CARMEN / ETUNIMI CARMEN

PRISCILLA – QUEEN OF THE DESERT / PRISCILLA – AAVIKON KUNINGATAR

QUEEN AT SEA

REISE INS EHEBETT / MATKA AVIOVUOTEESEEN

REMAKE

SBORMISTR / BROKEN VOICES

SHE-DEVIL / NAISPAHOLAINEN

SISU 2 / SISU: ROAD TO REVENGE

SMITHEREENS / RAKASTA MINUA, MANHATTAN

SNĔHULÁK / SNOWMAN (c.m. Hermína Tyrlová 1966)

SOUMSOUM, LA NUIT DES ASTRES / SOUMSOUM, THE NIGHT OF THE STARS

STELLA

STILLE FREUNDIN / SILENT FRIEND

SVEČIAS – THE VISITOR

TEISEL POOL METSA / ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WOODS (c.m. Anu-Laura Tuttelberg 2014)

TERAPIA / THERAPY

DÄUMELINCHEN / THUMBELINA (c.m. Lotte Reiniger 1954)

TJ28

TOMBOUCTOU: LE CHAGRIN DES OISEAUX / TIMBUKTU

TRAUM VON LIESCHEN MÜLLER, DER / DREAM OF LIESCHEN MÜLLER, THE

TUOMARI NURMIO – 13 KYLMÄÄ LAULUA

VACANCES DE MONSIEUR HULOT, LES / RIEMULOMA RIVIERALLA

VIE SUR TERRE, LA / LIFE ON EARTH

VIE, UNE / A WOMAN’S LIFE (Stéphane Brizé)

VITA MIA (IT 2025)

VOICES (c.m. Joanna Priestley 1985)

WHOLE SHEBANG, THE (c.m. Ken & Flo Jacobs, 2019)

WITH YOUR EYES CLOSED (c.m. Renata Gąsiorowska, 2015)

ZOMBIE JA KUMMITUSJUNA

DVA PROKURORA / ZWEI STAATSANWÄLTE / TWO PROSECUTORS

ÄLÄ ITKE, IINES / GONE WITH THE MIND

Marilyn Monroe's Personal Library (Gail Crowther 2026 / from Christie's catalogue 1999 / alphabetized by Antti Alanen 2026)

Henri Cartier-Bresson: The Decisive Moment (New York, 1952). Cover art by Henri Matisse. First Edition. Presentation copy inscribed by Cartier-Bresson to Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller. Item number one in Christie's catalogue.

MARILYN MONROE’S PERSONAL LIBRARY

Listed by genre in Christie’s catalogue The Personal Papers of Marilyn Monroe (1999). The categorization was organized by Christie’s for sale lots. Source: Gail Crowther: Marilyn and Her Books: the Literary Life of Marilyn Monroe (2026), pages 253–278. Edited in alphabetic order by Antti Alanen, 2026.

A

Agee, James: A Death in the Family (1957)

Alberti, Rafael: Selected Poems (1944)

Album of the Cambridge Garrick Club, The (1836)

Aldrich, Richard: Gertrude Lawrence as Mrs. A.

Alexander, F. Matthias: Man’s Supreme Inheritance (1941)

Alexander, F. Matthias: The Use of the Self (1955)

Almanach: das 73 Jahr by S. Fischer Verlag (1959)

Anderson, Maxwell: Joan of Lorraine (1947)

Anderson, Sherwood: Wineburg, Ohio (1919)

Andrews, Matthew: Let’s Make Love (1960)

Anglund, Joan Walsh: A Friend Is Someone Who Likes You (1958)

Anouilh, Jean: Antigone (1947)

Aristophanes: Two Plays: Peace and Lysistrate (1953)

Aristotle: Metaphysics (1949)

Aristotle: Theory of Poetry and Fine Art (1951)

Armstrong, Charlotte: Mischief (1950)

B

Bahâ’í Prayers (1957) [Bahâ’í, founded by Baha’ullah in Iran in 1863, is the most recent worldwide religion, monotheistic and ecumenic]

Bates, Marston: The Forest and the Sea (1960)

Bates, Ralph: Schubert (1935)

Beard, Rebecca: Everyman’s Search (1950)

Becker, Ivan Lawrence: The Vapor Trail (1959)

Beckett, Samuel: The Unnamable (1958)

Bedside Book of Famous American Stories, The (1940)

Bemelmans, Ludwig: How to Travel Incognito (1951)

Bemelmans, Ludwig: To the One I Love Best (1955)

Bessie, Alvah: The Un-Americans (1957)

Best American Plays: Third Series, 1945–1951 (1952)

Best American Short Stories, The (1960)

Bible, The

Blake, William: The Portable Blake (1955)

Bloy, Leon: The Woman Who Was Poor (1947)

Boothe, Clare: The Women (1937)

Boros, Eva: The Mermaids (1956)

Boulton, Agnes: Part of a Long Story: Eugene O’Neill as a Young Man in Love (1958)

Boussard, Jacques: London (1951)

Bowen, Elizabeth: A Time in Rome (1960)

Braden, Anne: The Wall Between (1958) [inside story from the civil rights movement]

Breslow, Paul: The Support of the Mysteries (1960)

Bristol, Claude M.: The Magic of Believing (1951)

Bristol, Claude M.: TNT: The Power Within You (1959)

Brockway, Wallace & Herbert Weinstock: Men of Music (1950)

Bromfield, Louis: The Rains Came

Bronson, Julien: Pet Turtles (1954)

Browning, John: The Poetical Works of John Browning (1949)

Buber, Martin: The Tales of Rabbi Nachman (1956)

Burns, Robert: Poems of Robert Burns, ed. Henry Meikle & William Beattie (1946)

Burns, Sheelagh: The Gingko Tree (1957)

Burrows, Millar: The Dead Sea Scrolls (1956)

Buttle, Myra: The Sweeniad (1957)

C

Caldwell, Erskine: God’s Little Acre (1933)

Campbell, Alexander: The Heart of India (1958)

Campbell, Joseph: The Masks of God: Primitive Mythology (1959)

Camus, Albert: The Fall (1959)

Camus, Albert: The Rebel

Carpozi, George: Marilyn Monroe (1961)

Carroll, Lewis: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland ; Through the Looking-Glass ; The Hunting of the Snark (n.d.)

Cartier-Bresson, Henri: The Decisive Moment (1952)

Cary, Joyce: Mister Johnson

Catechism for Young Children (1936)

Cather, Willa: A Lost Lady

Cather, Willa: Lucy Gayheart (1935)

Cather, Willa: My Ántonia (1918)

Cerf, Bennett & Van H. Cartmell (ed.): Sixteen Famous European Plays (1943)

Chapman, John: Theatre ’53 (1953)

Chekhov, Anton: The Plays of Anton Chekhov (n.d.)

Chekhov, Anton: The Viking Library Portable Chekhov (1947)

Chekhov, Michael: To the Actor

Christman, Henry M. (ed.): A View of the Nation: An Anthology: 1955–1959 (1959)

Clune, Henry W.: Six O’Clock Casual (1960)

Colette: Short Novels of Colette (1951)

Colette: The Short Novels of Colette (1953)

Collier, John: Fancies and Goodnights (1951)

Collier, Robert: The Magic Word L-I-D-G-T-T-F-T-A-T-I-M (1940)

Conrad, Joseph: The Secret Agent (1955)

Corbett, Jim: Jungle Lore (1955)

Corbett, Jim: Man-Eaters of India (1955)

Corbett, Jim: My India (1958)

Cordier, Daniel: Jean Dubuffet (1960)

Corwin, Norman: More by Corwin (1945)

Corwin, Norman: Thirteen by Corwin (1949)

Corwin, Norman: Untitled and Other Radio Drama (1947)

Cost, March: I, Rachel

D

Davidson, Irwin & Richard Gehman: The Jury Is Still Out (1959) [case study of US legal system with seven youths in a murder trial involving a multi-ethnic NY gang, co-inspired West Side Story]

De Mille, Agnes: Dance to the Piper (1952)

Del Piombo, Akbar & Norman Rubington: The Hero Maker (1960)

Devi, Indra: Forever Young, Forever Healthy (1957)

Di Donato, Pietro: Three Circles of Light (1960)

Dickinson, Emily: Selected Poems (1924)

Dolci, Danilo: Report from Palermo (1959) [“Gandhi of Sicily” on post-WW Sicily, including Mafia]

Doresse, Jean: The Secret Books of the Egyptian Gnostics (1960)

Dostoevsky, Fyodor: Crime and Punishment (1950)

Dostoevsky, Fyodor: The Brothers Karamazov

Dostoevsky, Fyodor: The House of the Dead (n.d.)

Douglas, William O.: Russian Journey (1956)

Douglas, William O.: The Right of the People (1958) [justice during the Cold War, by the most liberal justice in U.S. Supreme Court history and the longest serving]

Draper, Theodore: The Roots of American Communism (1957) [classic history of the American Communist Party]

Dreiser, Theodore: An American Tragedy (1948)

Dreiser, Theodore: Sister Carrie (1927)

Dumas, Alexandre: Camille (n.d.)

Dunlop, Hazel Peckinpaugh: Flower Arranging for Fun (1959)

Durrell, Lawrence: Balthazar (1958)

Durrell, Lawrence: Justine (1957) first edition

Durrell, Lawrence: Justine (1960)

Dustan, Alice: Landscaping Your Own Home (1953)

E

Eddy, Mary Baker: Poems, including Christ and Christmas (1925)

Eddy, Mary Baker: Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (1934)

Edman, Irwin (ed.): The Philosophy of Plato (1928) [from: The Republic, The Symposium, Apology, Phaedo, Crito]

Edman, Irwin: The Philosophy of Schopenhauer (1928)

Ehmann, K.: Christliches Vergissmeinnicht (n.d.)

Einstein, Albert: Out of My Later Years (1950)

Ellison, Ralph: Invisible Man (1952)

Emerson, Ralph Waldo: Essays

Evergreen Review. Volume 2. Number 6 (1958)

Ewen, David: Music for the Millions (1950)

F

Fast, Howard: Spartacus (1952)

Faulkner, William: The Sound and the Fury / As I Lay Dying (1946)

Fitzgerald, F. Scott: Tender Is the Night (1934)

Fitzgerald, F. Scott: The Great Gatsby (1953)

Flaubert, Gustave: Madame Bovary (1957)

Flaubert, Gustave: Madame Bovary (n.d.)

Fleming, Ian: From Russia, with Love (1957)

Flender, Harold: Paris Blues (1957)

Form of Daily Prayers, The (1922)

Fowler, Gene: Good Night, Sweet Prince

Frazer, James G.: The Golden Bough (1940)

Freeman, Lucy: Troubled Women (1959)

Freeman, Mary: D. H. Lawrence: a Basic Study of His Ideas (1955)

Freud, Martin: Glory Reflected (n.d.)

Freud, Sigmund: Letters of Sigmund Freud, ed. Ernest L. Freud (1960)

Freud, Sigmund: Moses and Monotheism (1957)

Freud, Sigmund: The Psychopathology of Everyday Life

Fromm, Erich: The Art of Loving (1956)

Frost, Robert: Robert Frost’s Poems ed. Louis Untermeyer (1959)

G

Gallie, Menna: Strike for a Kingdom (1959)

García Lorca, Federico: Poet in New York (1955)

Gary, Romain: A European Education (1960)

Gatlin, Dana: Prayer Changes Things (1952)

Gaver, Jack: Critics’ Choice (1955)

Gellhorn, Walter: American Rights: The Constitution in Action (1960) [top ranking legal scholar]

Gibran, Kahlil: Jesus the Son of Man (1949)

Gibran, Kahlil: The Prophet (1950)

Gibran, Kahlil: The Prophet (1951) (duplicate)

Gibran, Kahlil: The Prophet (1953)

Gibran, Kahlil: The Prophet (1961)

Gill, Brendan: The Day the Money Stopped (1957)

Ginzburg, Benjamin: Rededication in Freedom (1959). Two copies. [against McCarthyist thought-control as a threat to American freedom]

Giovannetti, Pericle Luigi: Max (1957)

Glassner, John (ed.): Twenty Best Plays of the Modern American Theatre (1939)

Gorchakov, Edith: Stanislavsky Directs

Goudeker, Maurice: Close to Colette (1957)

Greene, Graham: Brighton Rock (1958)

Greene, Graham: The Potting Shed (1957)

Greenwald, Harold: The Call Girl (1958)

Gross, Milton: His Brother’s Keeper (1961) three-page extract from Reader’s Digest

Guthrie, Woody: Bound for Glory (1943)

H

Halldór Laxness: Independent People (1946)

Halliday, E. M.: The Ignorant Armies (1958) [US military in the Intervention Wars in Russian Archangel in 1918].

Halsey, Margaret: The Demi-Paradise (1960)

Hamilton, Edith: Mythology (1955)

Hamilton, Edith: Mythology (duplicate)

Harris, Mark: Wake Up, Stupid (1959)

Hart, Moss: Act One (1959)

Hatcher, Harlan: Modern American Dramas (1949)

Hávamál, The by D. E. Martin Clarke (1923)

Hecht, Ben: Miracle in the Rain (1943)

Heine, Heinrich: The Poetry and Prose of Heinrich Heine by Frederic Ewen (1948)

Hemingway, Ernest: A Farewell to Arms (1932)

Hemingway, Ernest: The Sun Also Rises (1926)

Hersey, John: The War Lover (1959)

Holy Scriptures, The, According to the Masoretic Text (1952)

Horizon: A Magazine of the Arts. Nov. 1959, Jan. 1960, March 1960

Housman, A. E.: A Shropshire Lad (n.d.)

Hudson, W. H.: Green Mansions (1936)

Hughes, Emmet John: America the Vincible (1959) [advisor to Eisenhower and Rockefeller]

Hughes, Richard: A High Wind in Jamaica (1932)

Hugo’s Pocket Dictionary. French-English and English-French (n.d.)

Hurnscot, Loran: A Prison, A Paradise (1959)

Huston, John: Frankie and Johnny (1930)

I

Ibsen, Henrik: An Enemy of the People, edited by Arthur Miller

J

James, Henry: The Complete Plays of Henry James (1949)

Jameson, Storm: A Cup of Tea for Mr. Thorgill (1957)

Jeffers, Robinson: Medea (1948)

Jeffers, Robinson: Selected Poetry (1938)

Johnson, Osa: I Married Adventure

Jones, Ernest: The Life and Work of Sigmund Freud I–III (1959)

Josephson, Hannah & Malcolm Cowley: Aragon, Poet of the French Resistance (1945)

Joyce, James: Dubliners (n.d.)

Joyce, James: Ulysses (1934)

K

Kahler, Erich: The Tower and the Abyss: an Inquiry into the Transformation of the Individual (1957) [cultural historian]

Kandel, Howard & Don Safran: Stoned Like a Statue: A Complete Survey of Drinking Cliches, Primitive, Classical and Modern (1961)

Kanin, Garson: Blow Up a Storm (1959)

Kanin, Garson: Born Yesterday (1946)

Kany, Charles & Mathurin Dondo: Spoken French for Travelers and Tourists (1946)

Kapelner, Alan: All the Naked Heroes (1960)

Kazantzakis, Nikos: The Last Temptation of Christ (1960)

Kazantzakis, Nikos: The Saviors of God: Spiritual Exercises (1960)

Kennedy, Joseph A.: Relax and Live! (1953)

Kerouac, Jack: On the Road (1957)

Kersh, Gerald: Fowlers End (1957)

Kertzer, Morris: What Is a Jew? (1953)

Kopplin, Dorothea S.: Something to Live By (1948) [poems and aphorisms for a life in harmony by a Mother of the Year]

Kovacs, Ernie: How to Talk at Gin (1962)

Kunstler, William: First Degree (1960) [18 murder prosecutions discussed by noted DA]

L

Lambert, Gavin: The Slide Area (1959)

Lang, Daniel: From Hiroshima to the Moon (1959)

Lanyon, Walter C.: And It Was Told of a Certain Potter (1922)

Laurence, William: Men and Atoms (1959)

Lawrence, D. H.: Etruscan Places (1957)

Lawrence, D. H.: Selected Poems (1959)

Lawrence, D. H.: Sons and Lovers (1922)

Lawrence, D. H.: Sons and Lovers (1960)

Lawrence, D. H.: The Portable D. H. Lawrence (1959)

LeCron, Leslie & Jean Bordeaux: Hypnotism Today (1947)

Lee, C. Y.: The Sawbwa and His Secretary (1959)

Lembourn, Hans Jørgen: The Best of All Worlds, or, What Voltaire Never Knew (1961)

Lerner, Max: The Unfinished Country (1959)

Liebman, Joshua Loth: Peace of Mind (1946)

Lin Yutang: The Importance of Living

Love Poems and Love Letters for All the Year (n.d.)

Lowry, Malcolm: Hear Us O Lord from Heaven Thy Dwelling Place (1961)

Lucretius: Of the Nature of Things (1957)

Ludwig, Emil: Napoleon (n.d.)

Lynes, Russell: Snobs (1950)

M

Mailer, Norman: The Deer Park

Malamud, Bernard: The Assistant (1957)

Malamud, Bernard: The Magic Barrel (1958)

Maltz, Maxwell: Doctor Pygmalion (1958)

Mann, Thomas: Death in Venice and Seven Other Stories (1956)

Mann, Thomas: Last Essays (1959)

Mann, Thomas: The Thomas Mann Reader (1950)

Markel, Lester (ed.): Background and Foreground. An Anthology of Articles from the New York Times Magazine (1960)

Marquis, Don: The Life and Times of Archy and Mehitabel (1950)

Martin, Peter: The Building (1960)

Marx, Karl: Das Kapital (New York, 1906) [milestone English edition]

Maugham, Somerset: Of Human Bondage (n.d.)

Maugham, Viscount: The Truth About the Munich Crisis (1944) [defense of appeasement]

Maugham, W. Somerset: The Summing Up (1951)

Maule, Hamilton: Jeremy Todd (1959)

Mawson, C. O. & K. A. Whiting: Roget’s Pocket Thesaurus (1953)

Maxwell, Elsa: How to Do It, or, The Art of Lively Entertaining (1957)

Maxwell, Gavin: God Protect Me from My Friends (1956)

McCarthy, Mary: Memories of a Catholic Girlhood (1957)

McCullers, Carson: The Ballad of the Sad Café (1951)

McGinley, Phyllis: Merry Christmas, Happy New Year (1958)

Menninger, Karl: Man Against Himself (1938)

Merritt-Farmer, Fannie: The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book (1951)

Michener, James: Hawaii (1959)

Millay, Edna St. Vincent: Collected Sonnets (1941)

Millay, Edna St. Vincent: Collected Sonnets (1959)

Miller, Arthur: En mands ansigt (1946) [Focus, 1945]

Miller, Perry: The American Puritans: Their Prose and Their Poetry (1956)

Milner, Esther: The Failure of Success (1959)

Milton, John: The Poetical Works of John Milton, ed. H. C. Beeching (1941)

Molière: Plays by Molière (n.d.)

Monsarrat, Nicholas: The Story of Esther Costello (1953)

Morris, Charles: The Open Self (1948)

Munro, Daniel Colin: Man Alive, You’re Half Dead! (1948) inscribed to Renna Campbell, MM facialist

Murphy, Joseph: The Miracles of Your Mind (1953)

N

Nannes, Caspar: Politics in the American Drama (1960)

Narayan, R. K.: The Guide (1958)

Nesbitt, Arthur: Say You Never Saw Me (1957)

New World Writing Number 16 (1960)

New York State Vacationlands (1959)

O

O’Casey, Sean: I Knock at the Door (1949)

O’Casey, Sean: Red Roses for Me (1944)

O’Casey, Sean: Selected Plays I–II (1950)

O’Casey, Sean: The Green Crow (1956)

O’Connell, Alberta: Strange Prologue (1960)

O’Kearney, John: Red Mirage (1958)

O’Neil, Russell: Jonathan (1959)

O’Neill, Eugene: Anna Christie / The Emperor Jones / The Hairy Ape (1937)

O’Neill, Eugene: Long Day’s Journey into Night (1956)

O’Neill, Eugene: Long Day’s Journey into Night (1959)

Odets, Clifford: Clash by Night (1942)

Odets, Clifford: Golden Boy (1937)

Odets, Clifford: Six Plays of Clifford Odets (1939)

Odets, Clifford: The Country Girl (1951)

Oppenheimer, George: The Passionate Playgoer (1958)

Oppenheimer, J. Robert: The Open Mind (1955)

Outpost Nurseries, publicity brochure

P

Paine, Thomas: Rights of Man

Paley, Grace: The Little Disturbances of Man (1959)

Pappenheim, Fritz: The Alienation of Modern Man (1959)

Parker, Dorothy: The Collected Short Stories (1942)

Parker, Dorothy: The Portable Dorothy Parker (1958)

Partch, Virgil: VIP Tosses a Party (1959)

Pasinetti, P. M.: Venetian Red (1960)

Pearson, William: A Fever in the Blood (1959)

Penguin Book of English Verse, The, ed. John Hayward (1956)

Piper, Watty: The New Little Engine That Could (1930)

Pirandello, Luigi: The Medals and Other Stories (1959)

Plutarch: Lives Vol 3-6 (of six) by William and John Langhorne (1792)

Poe, Edgar Allan: Poe: Complete Poems ed. Richard Wilbur (1960)

Poe, Edgar Allan: The Portable Poe (1957)

Poetry: A Magazine of Verse Vol. 70, no. 6 (1947)

Pollini, Francis: Night (1960)

Pope, Alexander: Selected Works (1951)

Portable Irish Reader, The (1956)

Proust, Marcel: Cities of the Plain (1955)

Proust, Marcel: Swann’s Way

Proust, Marcel: The Captive (1956)

Proust, Marcel: The Guermantes Way (1952)

Proust, Marcel: The Sweet Cheat Gone (1930)

Proust, Marcel: Within a Budding Grove (1951)

Purdy, James: Don’t Call Me by My Right Name and Other Stories (1956)

Purdy, James: Malcolm (1959)

Pushkin, Alexander: The Poems, Prose and Plays of Alexander Pushkin (1936)

Q

Quayle, Anthony: On Such a Night (1948)

R

Rabelais: The Works of Rabelais (n.d.)

Rand, Christopher: The Twain Shall Meet (1957)

Ratner, Joseph: The Philosophy of Spinoza (1927)

Reynolds, Quentin, Ephraim Katz & Zwy Aldouby: Minister of Death: the Adolf Eichmann Story (1960)

Rilke, Rainer Maria: Letters to a Young Poet

Rilke, Rainer Maria: Selected Poems (1957)

Robbins, Harold: The Carpetbaggers (1961)

Rodman, Selden (ed.): One Hundred Modern Poems (1953)

Rolan, Lina: Mujer (1961)

Rombauer, Irma S. & Marion Rombauer Becker: The New Joy of Cooking (1953)

Rosten, Leo: Captain Newman, M.D.

Rosten, Norman: Song for Patricia

Russell, Bertrand: Common Sense and Nuclear Warfare (1959)

Russell, Bertrand: Our Knowledge of the External World (1956)

Russell, Bertrand: Why I Am Not a Christian (1957)

S

Saint-Exupéry, Antoine de: The Little Prince

Saint-Exupéry, Antoine de: The Wisdom of the Sands (1950)

Saint-Exupéry, Consuelo de: Kingdom of the Rocks (1946)

Salisbury, Harrison E.: The Shook-Up Generation (1958)

Salter, Andrew: Conditioned Reflex Therapy (1949)

Sandburg, Carl: Biography of Abraham Lincoln 1–6   

Schaper, Edzard: The Dancing Bear (1961)

Scott, Paul: The Mark of the Warrior (1958)

Seghers, Anna: The Seventh Cross (1945)

Seltzer, Thomas: Best Russian Stories: An Anthology (1925)

Sephath Emeth (Speech of Truth): Order of Prayers for the Whole Year (1926)

Seymour, E. L. D.: The Wise Garden Encyclopedia (1938)

Seymour, E. L. D.: The Wise Garden Encyclopedia (1957)

Shakespeare, William: Sonnets, ed. Mary Jane Gorton (n.d.)

Shapley, Harlow: Of Stars and Men (1959)

Shaw, Bernard & Mrs. Purrick Campbell: Their Correspondence (1952)

Shaw, George Bernard: Selected Plays of Bernard Shaw III (1948)

Shelley, Percy Bysshe: The Poetical Works of Shelley, ed. Richard Wilbur (n.d.)

Short Story Masterpieces (1960)

Skira, Albert: Renoir (1954) [Pierre-Auguste Renoir]

Snow, Edgar: Journey to the Beginning (1958) [autobiographical about China before 1949]

Southern, Terry: The Magic Christian (1960)

Spencer, Hazelton: Elizabethan Plays (1933)

Spock, Dr. Benjamin: Baby and Child Care (1958)

Stanislavski, Konstantin: An Actor Prepares

Starkey, Marion: The Devil in Massachusetts (1950) [Salem witch trials, inspired Arthur Miller]

Steffens, Lincoln: The Autobiography of Lincoln Steffens

Steichen, Edward & Carl Sandburg: The Family of Man (1955)

Steinbeck, John: Once There Was a War (1958)

Steinbeck, John: The Short Reign of Pippin IV (1957)

Steinbeck, John: Tortilla Flat (1937)

Steinberg, Milton: A Partisan Guide to the Jewish Problem (1945)

Steiner, Rudolph: Some Characteristics of Today (n.d.)

Steinhardt, Herschel: Sons of Men (1959)

Stendhal: The Red and the Black (1953)

Stern, Daniel: Miss America (1959)

Stone, Irving: Lust for Life

Styron, William: Lie Down in Darkness (1959)

Styron, William: Set This House on Fire (1960)

Sullivan, J. W. N.: Beethoven: His Spiritual Development (1949)

Swarthout, Glendon: They Came to Cordura (1958)

Symonds, John Addington: The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti (n.d.)

T

Tagliabue, John: Poems (1959)

Tannenbaum, R. F. (ed.): Panorama: A New Review (1957)

Teale, Edwin Way: A Book About Bees (1940)

Terry, Ellen & Bernard Shaw: A Correspondence (1949)

This Week’s Short-Stories (1953)

Thomas, Dylan: Portrait of an Artist as a Young Dog (1954)

Thomas, Norman: A Socialist’s Faith (1951) [presidential candicate in six elections 1928–1948]

Three Famous French Romances (n.d.) [Daudet: Sapho ; Abbé Prévost: Manon Lescaut ; Mérimée: Carmen]

Thurber, James: Thurber Country (1953)

Tilden, Marjorie: Star Crossed (1947)

Tocqueville, Alexis de: Democracy in America (1958) Vol II only

Todd, Mabel Elsworth: The Thinking Body

Tolstoy, Leo: Redemption and Two Other Plays (1919)

Toynbee, Arnold: A Study in History (1947)

Turgenev, Ivan: Smoke (1951)

Twain, Mark: In Defense of Harriet Shelley and Other Essays (n.d.)

Twain, Mark: Roughing It (n.d.)

Twain, Mark: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (n.d.)

Twain, Mark: The American Claimant and Other Stories and Sketches (n.d.)

U

Ustinov, Peter: Add a Dash of Pity (1959)

V

Vailland, Roger: The Law (1958)

Van Druten, John: Bell, Book and Candle (1951)

Vance, Randolph: Who Blowed Up the Church House? and Other Ozark Folk Tales (1952)

Varna, Andrew: World Underworld (1957) [pen name of an international smuggler who wrote about his experiences in the world of crime]

Vesalius, Andreas: De humani corporis fabrica (On the Fabric of the Human Body)

W

Wain, John: The Contenders (1958)

Waley, Arthur: Yuan Mei: Eighteenth Century Chinese Poet (1956)

Watkins, Sylvestre C.: An Anthology of American Negro Literature (1944)

Weaver, William: Duse: A Biography

Weber, Max: Max Weber (1954) [the American painter]

Webster, Gary: Codfish, Cats and Civilization (1959)

Weeks, Robert P.: Commonwealth vs. Sacco and Vanzetti (1958)

Wershub, Leonard Paul: Sexual Impotence in the Male (1959)

West, Mae: Goodness Had Nothing to Do with It (1959)

West, Morris L.: The Devil’s Advocate (1959)

West, Rebecca: A Train of Powder (1955) [murder trials, including Nuremberg]

Wheeler, Eleanor: Lidice (1957)

White, Theodore H.: The Mountain Road (1958)

Whitman, Walt: The Portable Walt Whitman (1955)

Wilde, Oscar: The Poems and Fairy-Tales (n.d.)

Williams, Oscar (ed.): The Pocketbook of Modern Verse (1954)

Williams, Tennessee: 27 Wagons Full of Cotton, and Other Plays (1945)

Williams, Tennessee: A Streetcar Named Desire (1953)

Williams, Tennessee: Camino Real (1953)

Williams, Tennessee: Orpheus Descending (1959)

Williams, Tennessee: The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone (1950)

Wilson, Edmund: A Piece of My Mind (1956)

Winnett, Ralph: Hurricane Season (1957)

Wolfe, Thomas: A Stone, A Leaf, A Door (1948)

Wolfe, Thomas: Look Homeward, Angel (1929)

Wolfe, Thomas: The Story of a Novel (1949)

Wolfe, Thomas: Thomas Wolfe’s Letters to His Mother (1945)

Wordsworth. Ed. Richard Wilbur (1959)

Y

Yeats, W. B.: Poems of W. B. Yeats

Young, Gordon: The Cat with Two Faces (1957) inscribed by Clifford Odets to MM

Young, Stark: The Flower in Drama and Glamour (1955)

Z

Zola, Émile: Nana (n.d.)

Zolotow, Maurice: Oh Careless Love (1959)