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.

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 • 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 document of the firepower of the spirit. It is about the essence of culture in a moment when culture is endangered by budget cuts, self-censorship and IT oligarchs. Thirty years ago the internet was a force of good but is now turning into a force of distraction. We need more culture than before.

Culture is our superpower, and the life of Arja Saijonmaa is evidence of this, from the volcanic debut in Lapualaisooppera (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 genius composer and conductor, discovered Arja: "tämä ääni ei mahdu tähän huoneeseen" ["this room is not big enough for her voice"]. In a disgraceful detour, Chydenius in a later turn became a political hack applying a mafia boss approach to the one who did not toe his party line. Arja chose a bigger sky 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 for him 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 of the film is about an Israeli-Palestinian solidary 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 joint 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 visiting 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 participate in the reportedly volcanic experience of Lapualaisooppera in 1966. But I experienced the bolt of lightning of one of Arja 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 Saijonmaa 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 drown each other to the swamp by song.

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

...

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