Modern Times (Studio Aalto amphitheatre / Alvar Aalto Foundation / Alvar Aalto Museum)

Charles Chaplin: Modern Times (US 1936). French 1972 re-release poster design: Leo Kouper.

Charles Chaplin: Modern Times (US 1936). Might this have inspired Rossellini's Dov'è la libertà...? / Where Is Freedom? (IT 1954).

Charles Chaplin: Modern Times (US 1936). Coffee break with the minister's wife (Mira McKinney). The impact of the acidic coffee is conveyed wordlessly on the soundtrack.

Charles Chaplin: Modern Times (US 1936). Unwittingly, Charlie catches some of the smuggled "nose powder" in the salt shaker.

Göran Schildt: Moderna tider: Alvar Aaltos möte med funktionalismen [Modern Times: Alvar Aalto's Encounter with Functionalism] / Alvar Aalto. The Decisive Years (1985). 

The amphitheatre at Studio Aalto (1954-55 / 1962-63). Photo: Maija Holma / Alvar Aalto Foundation.

Open air screening at the amphitheatre of Studio Aalto.

Studio Aalto / Alvar Aallon ateljee.

Alvar Aalto Foundation / Alvar Aalto -säätiö.

Alvar Aalto -museo / Alvar Aalto Museum.

Tiilimäki 20, Munkkiniemi, 00300 Helsinki

Charles Chaplin: Modern Times (US 1936). 4K DCP, restored by Fondazione Cineteca di Bologna, the original Charles Chaplin score rearranged and rerecorded by Timothy Brock (2000), the film rereleased by MK2 (2001) and distributed in Nordic countries by NonStop Entertainment (2016), in Finland by ELKE with Finnish subtitles.

AA: I visit Studio Aalto for the first time. I like its English title. Alvar Aalto always acknowledged his wife - first Aino, after her death, Elissa - as an equal partner and would have refused crediting only him by first name. It would be about time to update all credits to pure "Aalto".

I fall in love with the place instantly. It is modernist-functional, while acknowledging the legacy of classical antiquity, not least in the amphitheatre. The inspiring office feels like home. Built space blends seamlessly with nature.

Today is the first ever public film screening at Studio Aalto. The audience has come despite the rain. Some stay indoors while others prefer outdoors. The evening is warm.

I give an introduction about Filmistudio Projektio, the first Finnish film society, the chairman and firebrand of which was Alvar Aalto, inspired by the international film society movement in France, the Netherlands (Filmliga), England (The London Film Society, celebrating its centenary this year) and the Nordic countries (Gösta Werner was our contact since 1934).

The 1930s were a decade of cultural and political turmoil in Finland. Unlike many countries on Russia's eastern border (such as Hungary, Poland and the Baltic states), to speak nothing of Italy, Germany and Austria, Finland did not take a Fascist / authoritarian turn. There was a violent anti-democratic and anti-liberal nationalistic movement. But Finland stayed true to its Nordic heritage of freedom. Alvar Aalto promoted the broad-minded, democratic, liberal and international trend in Finnish culture. 

Aalto was a modernist in all ways: he loved urbanity (always inseparable from nature), planes, automobiles, jazz (the anthem of Projektio was Duke Ellington's "Mood Indigo") and cinema. He was a Charles Chaplin fan to the point of identification.

Projektio screened City Lights. Chaplin's next movie, Modern Times, had its Finnish premiere a month before Projektio shut down. Like Chaplin, Aalto embraced modernity while alerting of its abuse - the danger of the human being being turned into a cog in the machine. For Aalto and Chaplin, humanity came first.

The Finnish secret police, Suojelupoliisi, spied on the "dangerously liberal" Projektio vigilantly.  (Its chief, Esko Riekki, was later in charge of the recruitment of the Finnish SS Battalion). Projektio was frequented by cultural circles, ministers of the government, ambassadors and diplomats. Also the major film directors Valentin Vaala, Teuvo Tulio and Nyrki Tapiovaara, as well as Heikki Aho and Björn Soldan, the sons of the author Juhani Aho who founded the Finnish documentary cinema as an art form. Plus students of the Piirustuskoulu [Art School] of Ateneum the National Gallery such as the young couple Sam Vanni and Tove Jansson (today the successor of the school belongs to Aalto University). The harassment caused such a scandal that Suojelupoliisi was disbanded (to be replaced by Valtiollinen poliisi), the government resigned, and Projektio closed down.

Although Projektio was active only for three years, it became an enduring inspiration and guiding light for Finnish film culture - including the Finnish film society movement and the Finnish Film Archive.

...

I stayed for the beginning of Modern Times, a film that I know so well that the best-known passages can feel over-familiar. The visual quality of the presentation was brilliant. I enjoyed the oddball passages most. The coffee break with the minister's wife, a shared endurance test with the acidic drink. The "nose powder" surprise in the salt dispenser. The satiric point of the Tramp preferring the prison to "freedom". 

Chaplin's previous three films (The Gold Rush, The Circus, City Lights) had formed a "trilogy of unrequited love". Now at last Charlie meets an equal partner in Paulette Goddard, and they leave towards the horizon together. These are hard times. It is not good to face them alone.

I blogged about the 2000 premiere at Bologna's Teatro Comunale of Modern Times with the Timothy Brock reconstruction of Chaplin's score.

I reviewed the 2003 dvd edition of the restored Modern Times.

I wrote the program note of the handbill of the 2009 Helsinki film concert of Modern Times at Finlandia Hall with Carl Davis conducting the Radio Symphony Orchestra to the Timothy Brock-arranged score.

I blogged about the 2014 tribute to the 80th anniversary of Filmistudio Projektio at Matin-Tupa, Ylistaro / Seinäjoki.

I blogged about the 2017 tribute to Filmistudio Projektio at Orion in the context of the Alvar Aalto and the Modern Form exhibition at Ateneum Art Museum.

I also blogged about the 2017 Alvar Aalto exhibition at Ateneum.

Shot on location at Bazoches-sur-Guyonne, France, at Maison Louis Carré, the twin of Studio Aalto: Victoria Schultz: On ne sait jamais / You Never Know (US/FR 2022).

My blog remarks on:

Virpi Suutari: Aalto (FI 2020).

Eino Ruutsalo: Alvar Aalto / Alvar Aalto. A Finnish Architect (FI 1972).

Eino Ruutsalo: Alvar Aalto (FI 1972) viewed in 2005.

Veikko Laihanen: Suomen Akatemian jäsenet: Alvar Aalto (FI 1962).

Alvar Aalto and the Cinema (seminar at Seinäjoki, 2014)

Future of Industry: 15th International Alvar Aalto Symposium (Jyväskylä 2021)

Alvar Aalto at Seinäjoki: four films (1952, 1961, 1962, 1966)

Aho & Soldan: Lappi rakentaa (1946)

Göran Schildt: Nykyaika: Alvar Aallon tutustuminen funktionalismiin (a book, FI 1985).

Aarno Mäkitalo & Leena Hautala: Kirkonrakentajat: Lakeuden Ristin rakennustyö 1957-1950 (footage shot in 1956-1960).

Sydney Pollack: Sketches of Frank Gehry (US/DE 2006).

Wikipedia: Studio Aalto.

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STUDIO AALTO OFFICIAL

Open-air screenings at Studio Aalto

 

The film club Projektio revived with open-air screenings at Studio Aalto!

Projektio was an art and experimental film club founded in 1934, at one time chaired by Alvar Aalto. The club, for instance, showed short films by the Aaltos’ modernist friends László Moholy-Nagy and Fernand Léger, as well as full-length silent films by Charlie Chaplin.

The theme of European Heritage Days 2025 is “Heritage and Architecture: Windows to the Past, Doors to the Future”, in honour of which the Alvar Aalto Foundation is staging two film screenings in the spirit of film club Projektio in the garden amphitheatre at Studio Aalto.

Friday, 12 September, 19:30: Charlie Chaplin’s classic Modern Times (1936). 1h 23min. Finnish subtitles. The screening will be introduced by film researcher Antti Alanen. The screening is fully booked.

Saturday, 13 September, 20:00: Architecton (2024), written and directed by Viktor Kossakovsky. 1h 38min. English-language documentary with Finnish subtitles. Tickets from Pop Up Kino Helsinki. Max. 75 spectators.

Bring your own sitting pad!

A photographer is present at the event and the images can be used for communications of the Alvar Aalto Foundation.

The screenings are arranged in cooperation with Pop Up Kino Helsinki. The event has been made possible by Artek Global and Iittala/Fiskars Group.

 

Studio Aalto, amphitheatre

Helsinki