Rovioiden ritarit

/ / FI / 1997 / Östling, Tom / / TV documentary

Rovioiden ritarit / Knights of the Bonfires. PC: Yleisradio TV 1. D+SC: Tom Östling. Featuring (film related interviewees): Arvo Salo, Kari Uusitalo, Matti Kassila, Aito Mäkinen, Jörn Donner, Hannu Leminen, Claes Olsson, Leo Stålhammar, Seppo Rustanius, Jarmo Jääskeläinen, Markku Jokipii, Maarit Pietinen, Gunnel Arrbäck, Birgit Bruun, James Ferman, Clifford Christians. 90’. PAL TV transmission. Viewed in Helsinki, Sunday, 9 November 1997. This was a summing-up of Östling’s trilogy on Finnish censorship (on banned books, films, and TV and radio programmes, originally produced in 1994-1996). It is an important survey in cultural history, and the abundant old clips are highly entertaining for today’s viewer. My five major criticisms would focus on: 1) the failure to recognize the difference between voluntary self-control and government censorship (in Finland first since 1946), 2) the neglect to mention that all the banned films mentioned in the lists have since been passed, often a long time ago, 3) most of the clips shown were never banned or cut in the first place: some were hypothetical illustrations, others were of films that got a higher rating than the distributor demanded, 4) the current large problem of criminal matter was only hinted at, and 5) there was no discussion of the Finnish video law, the severest in the world, which causes most of the programmes available to be banned on video distribution. That is a major censorship offense, a blatant infringement in a basic civil liberty.