Apinan vuosi / In the Year of the Ape (in the presence of Janne Kuusi)

Janne Kuusi: Apinan vuosi  / In the Year of the Ape (FI 1983). Heikki Salomaa as Ile.

Apans år. 

    FI 1983. PC: Elokuvatuottajat Oy. P: Claes Olsson, Matti Penttilä. 

    D: Janne Kuusi. SC: Harri Sirola, Janne Kuusi – based on the novel Abiturientti (1980) by Harri Sirola. DP: Tahvo Hirvonen - colour - 1:1,66. AD: Erkki Saarainen. COST: Irmeli Toivanen. M: Pekka Rechardt. ED: Anne Lakanen. S: Mikael Sievers. 

    CAST: Heikki Salomaa (Ile), Tiina Bergström (Suvi), Laura Heimo (Tanja), Rea Mauranen (Maria, the Finnish teacher), Elina Hurme (Sara, the girl in a leather jacket), Ilpo Kotanen (Klasu), Kari Väänänen (Rene), Heidi Krohn (Ile's mother), Aarre Karén (Ile's father), Marja-Leena Kouki (Suvi's mother), Esko Salminen (Suvi's father), Hanna Marttila (Suvi's friend), Ritva Sorvali (laughing woman), Markku Halme, Konsta Mäkelä, Ritva Rantasila (classmates), Kari Paukkunen (psychology teacher), Eero Tuomikoski (janitor), Jussi Parviainen, Tomi Salmela, Tapio Liinoja, Pekka Uotila, Seppo Luukkanen (Rene's henchmen), Timo Eränkö (De Sade), Paul Pentti (Marat), Aki Kaurismäki (Charlotte Corday), the Jack Helen Brut group. 

    94 min

    In the presence of Janne Kuusi hosted by Markku Varjola.

    A vintage print screened at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 29 Oct 2008

MV: the first Finnish surrealistic feature film. - JK: We were on terms with surrealism but tried to avoid aping. Initially planned as a tv movie it became a cinema film. We aimed at cinematic expression. There was in Finland a theatrical tradition and a literary tradition; we wanted to do cinema. The visual outlook is very distinctive. Heikki Salomaa got the lead role, soon to become well-known in the Lapinlahden Linnut team. The soundscape was also very ambitious. The film was the diploma work for Kuusi, Hirvonen, Lakanen, Sievers.

AA: This is the story of the "abiturientti" (candidate for the matriculation examination, graduating senior, preparatory student, upper-secondary school leaver) who is at the threshold of becoming an "ylioppilas" (student, undergraduate, upper secondary school-leaver), qualified to apply for admission to a university. These are the months of transition to adulthood.

Janne Kuusi and Harri Sirola turned Sirola's novel around and created a surrealistic vision. Ile, the young man, wants to apply for admission to the medical faculty. The "ylioppilaskirjoitukset" (the student exam, the written examination for higher certificate) are under way, but there is also partying and meeting girls. 

Ile is aimless in his relationships. There is the lovely and playful Suvi (Tiina Bergström), there is the dark, hard-to-get Tanja (Laura Heimo), there is the strongly personal Sara, the girl in the leather jacket (Elina Hurme), and even the striking Maria, the Finnish teacher (Rea Mauranen).

Maria's boyfriend is the violent Rene (Kari Väänänen), and through him there is a criminal gang element in the story. There is no clear line between dream and reality in the film. The "lakkiaisjuhla" (the private party of passing the student exam and getting the white student cap) is a big baroque banquet with scantily clad nymphs on horseback and a living Havis Amanda (the famous nude statue at Helsinki's Market Square, the Venus of Finland) (from the long shot it is difficult to see whether the live Havis Amanda is Tiina Bergström). The mounted nymphs take Ile with them and throw him to the basin at the statue Havis Amanda's fountain (the traditional place where students celebrate the First of May).

Läpimurto / The Breakthrough

Janne Kuusi: Läpimurto / The Breakthrough (FI 1981).

Genombrott.
    FI 1981. D: Janne Kuusi. SC: Janne Kuusi, Jouni Tommola. DP: Tahvo Hirvonen – 16 mm. Assistant Camera: Timo Salminen, Renny Harlin. ED: Anne Lakanen.
    C: Susanna Haavisto (Small Redhaired Girl), Matti Laustela (Moritz), Eero Saarinen (Jaska), Ulla Tapaninen (Priscilla), Timo Torikka (Max), Jukka Asikainen (Guard), Renny Harlin (Policeman), Jukka-Pekka Palo (Policeman), Kari Väänänen (Policeman), Elina Salo (Teacher), Janne Kuusi (Horseheaded Man).
    44 min.
    Viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 12 September 2008.
    Together with Valehtelija / The Liar, FI/DE 1981.
    Guests: Mika Kaurismäki, Janne Kuusi, Jouni Tommola.

JK, JT: the background was the students' theater of the 1970s. The film was a joint project of the theater school and the film school. The manuscript was a mere accident, just a list of scenes. There were no models of any kind. We hated the old theater, the affected way of reading the lines. We acted in a new way, put ourselves into it, meaning to rebel. We hardly knew anybody from the film scene. We irritated them and almost risked our lives. Maybe there is a Buñuel, Fellini connection. Fuck influences. To the hell with everything old. We wanted something new of our own. Maybe we sat on Buñuel thinking Fellini. Maybe the Kaurismäkis were thinking about Godard and Truffaut when they were thinking of nothing.

Print ok for 16 mm.

I saw but the beginning, it's all about theatre students and their rehearsals. A parodic revolutionary scene. Mirror rehearsals. A silent film parody, very lowbrow, more so than Spede Pasanen. A mixed sauna scene with booze and sex. The next day the rehearsals are interrupted by vomiting, the actors revolting. Here at 22 pm I called it a day