Pohjankävijäin merkintöjä / Northern Travelogues

The Crying Chukchi. Walrus carving, a crying human figure. A human figure, carved from walrus ivory, sitting with knees bent in front of him, elbows on his knees and hands on his face. The carving is the work of Maritime Chukchi Tshuuta of Dezhnevo village on the East Cape. Suomen kansallismuseo / Yleisetnografiset kokoelmat / Antellin kokoelmat. 6,90 x 3 cm. VK5794:1-35. Photo: Museovirasto / JL-Kuvastudio / Erik Lindroth.

Pohjankävijäin merkintöjä / Northern Travelogue. Photo: Tampere Film Festival.

Tampere Film Festival (TFF) / National Competition 3
7.3. THU/TO 11:00 | PLEVNA 5 |
Kira Jääskeläinen | Finland 2018 | Documentary | 58 min

TFF: "In 1917 Finnish explorer Sakari Pälsi travelled to north-eastern Siberia carrying a cinematograph and 13,000 feet of film with him. The journey birthed a unique documentary film and a travelogue. A hundred years later director Kira Jääskeläinen returns to the Bering strait in Pälsi’s footsteps. By combining old and new film footage, Pälsi’s notes and the stories of the local indigenous peoples, the film tells the story of the Chukchi and Siberian Eskimos from the days gone by till today."

"Vuonna 1917 suomalainen tutkimusmatkailija Sakari Pälsi matkusti Koillis-Siperiaan mukanaan kinematografi ja lähes 4 000 metriä filminauhaa. Matkan aikana syntyi ainutlaatuinen dokumenttielokuva ja matkakuvaus. Sata vuotta myöhemmin ohjaaja Kira Jääskeläinen palaa Pälsin jalanjäljissä Beringinsalmelle. Elokuva on yhdistelmä vanhaa ja uutta kuvamateriaalia, Pälsin muistiinpanoja ja paikallisten alkuperäisväestöjen tarinoita, ja se kuvaa tšuktšien ja Siperian eskimoiden elämää menneistä ajoista tähän päivään." (TFF)

AA: Three years before Nanook of the North, the archaeologist Dr. Sakari Pälsi, an expert of the stone age, made a wonderful ethnographic film called Arktisia matkakuvia / Travelling in the Arctic (FI 1917–1919). The film has been preserved by The Finnish Film Archive / National Audiovisual Institute. This year we are celebrating the centenary of this milestone of the genre.

For a long time already motion picture cameras had belonged to the standard equipment of scientific expeditions, and there was nothing unusual in Pälsi's decision to make a film. Pälsi's distinction was in his approach. He distanced himself from the already popular and superficial genre of the travelogue. Pälsi's focus was not in exotic attractions. Instead, he was seeking a genuine connection with the people he studied and was impressed with the Chukchi and Eskimo way of life.

The Chukchi are an indigenous people living in Northeast Siberia along the Bering Strait and the Chukchi Sea. Kira Jääskeläinen has already made a documentary film on Chukotka called Tagikaks (2012). In Northern Travelogues she returns to the Bering Strait and stages a time odyssey for the people she meets, arranging several screenings of Pälsi's film. We even visit a children's screening of Travelling in the Arctic. The past comes alive in the present.

A key image is a statue given to Pälsi by his friends, The Crying Chukchi. A stark and eloquent symbol of the fate of the Chukchi people, the closest relatives of the First Americans.

The Fall of the Wall in 1989–1991 took place also in the Bering Sea. In Uelen, Kira Jääskeläinen explores the saga of Teneskin, King of Uelen, who lived seven generations ago. His ancestors are also spread widely all over California, and relatives are now able to meet each other again after the Fall of the Ice Wall. A special word for these meetings, pagantikuk, means "crossing the strait".

There is a focus on art in Kira Jääskeläinen's meta-documentary. A wooden amulet carved in archaic fashion is the family protector. The Chukchi are sophisticated artists carving and painting objects from walrus teeth and whale bones. We visit a center of walrus bone art. Another current of Chukchi art is the extremely reduced and stark approach seen in The Crying Chukchi and the wooden family amulet.

During the Soviet era even Communist characters appeared in art objects fashioned in the traditional way. The Soviet era was calamitous for the language and culture of indigenous peoples. Russian language became dominant, and Chukchis were reduced to a minority in their own land. In three ways Soviet era was beneficial: in general culture, medicine and education. Life expectancy grew, and infant mortality sank.

Northern Travelogues is a beautiful and profound documentary exploration about cultural memory and identity. It is a time bridge over a century of epochal change in the land of an ancient people.

Mudar de Vida / Change of Life

Change One's Life. PT 1966. D: Paulo Rocha. This print 95 min. A Cinemateca Portuguesa print with e-subtitles in English viewed at Cinema Lapinsuu, Sodankylä (Midnight Sun Film Festival), 15 June 2013

Masterclass with José Manuel Costa, introduced by Peter von Bagh.

Peter von Bagh: "José Manuel Costa has worked for decades in leading posts of the famously excellent Portuguese Film Archive and also in various international cinema-related positions. What is essential in our view is that he is a remarkable film critic with the soul of a cinephile. Of the two areas close to Costa's heart – documentary, Portuguese cinema – we have chosen the latter, because so little of it is known in Finland. So, thanks to José Manuel Costa we now have the privilege to present wonderful director Paulo Rocha (1935–2012) and one of his greatest works, Mudar de vida (Change of Life, 1966)." (PvB)

The Festival Catalogue: "Paulo Rocha, (1935–2012) who passed away last December, was one of the leading figures in the Portuguese Cinema Novo movement (1963–1974). Change of Life, Rocha's second full feature is meant as a response to Manoel de Oliveira's Acto da Primavera (1963). The film observes and captures the life of the remote fishing village Furadouro, where a veteran of the Angolan war returns home to a changed world."
   "Rocha cleverly combines documentary form with melancholic poetry. Dressed in the many shades of gray, Change of Life shares many visual aspects not only with the British 1950/60 Kitchen Sink movies but also with the dreamy, mysterious landscapes of Dreyer's Vampyr. As a stylized, archaic depiction of work and everyday life, the film also resembles the Visconti classic The Earth Trembles, as well as many of the works of Vittorio De Seta, a guest at the Midnight Sun Film Festival in 2007."
   "A number of local villagers are cast as themselves, but among them we see also the work of professional actors such as Isabel Ruth, who subsequently became a recurring face in de Oliveira's films. This illusionless movie with a strong sense of nature has become a classic of Portuguese cinema. The impact of Change of Life can now, for example, be witnessed in the works of a newer master, Pedro Costa." (Lauri Timonen)
...
 
José Manuel Costa gave an enthusiastic presentation of Mudar de Vida.

"Paulo Rocha died during the very last days of last year. Since his debut feature film he was a key figure in Portuguese cinema, in the European film heritage. He was a friend with Glauber Rocha who led a parallel movement in Brazil. The leading actor of Mudar de Vida had also had the lead in Glauber Rocha's Deus e o Diabo na Terra do Sol / Black God White Devil; in Mudar de Vida he was dubbed by a Portuguese actor."

"Born in Porto, Paulo Rocha studied law and went to Paris where he studied at the IDHEC in 1959–1962. It was the key moment of la Nouvelle Vague, but Rocha had already been influenced by other things more than Godard and Truffaut, he had a wider sphere of influence including Renoir, Grémilllon, and Becker."

[Porto, in Portuguese also spelled as o Porto, or Oporto. It means "the port", and it is the root of the name of the country of Portugal. Also port wine is named after Porto. Porto lies in the valley of the river Douro.]

"Italian cinema, even Italian popular cinema, influenced Rocha. He was also close to the classical influence of Lang and Dreyer. He was attracted to the Japanese cinema, too, and for him Japan was also "my country". He went to Japan in 1975 and stayed for almost a decade as a cultural attaché. His movie A Ilha dos Amores / The Isle of Love was inspired by the Portuguese writer Wenceslau de Moraes who went to Japan and died there."

"Paulo Rocha directed the very first Novo Cinema movie, Verdes Anos / The Green Years. It was the era of the dictatorship of Salazar, and there was some kind of a film industry and a film movement. The 1950s had been a difficult decade; little film production existed. Now it was the beginning of a new world, and the cultivated Rocha was one of the leaders. In Paris he had frequented the mythical La Cinémathèque française, and he had come back with a new sense of a flim culture."

"Rocha's second film was very different. Verdes Anos had been shot in urban Lisbon. In Mudar de Vida, again, Rocha was set to tell a story about a man who doesn't fit – about a man who comes back and doesn't fit anymore."

"It all started with an idea of a place, a fishermen's place. Coming from Oporto, Rocha had come to see the fishermen as working heroes, big guys with their big boats, which were very hard to handle. The era of such boats was coming to an end. There is a documentary side in this movie. Although Rocha is a fiction director, he was also inspired to do anthropological research."

"The movie was shot in the Douro valley, and it showed the actual work of the fishermen during a time of transition, when there was already a bit of a crisis in the traditional profession. There were no jobs in agriculture, and industrialization was still in its early stages. The dictatorship meant censorship, and the very first thing affected was reality, which could be shown only in an indirect way, via ellipsis, via metaphor."

"Adelino, the protagonist, comes from military service in Africa. Contemporary viewers knew that he comes from the war in Angola in 1961, from fighting the liberation movement. The word 'war' was not uttered except in the Salazar propaganda. His mental state has changed in the war. He does not fit anymore."

"His love story has remained unfulfilled. His ex-fiancée Júlia (Maria Barroso) did not wait, and instead, has married Adelino's brother. Maria Barroso was a theatre actress, the wife of a Socialist leader, Mario Soares, who later became Prime Minister."

"Isabel Ruth, playing Albertina, had been the star of Rocha's first film. She had a dance career, and she was the main inspiration for Rocha. She was cast in the role of the new woman, the rebel, who does not accept the conditions, who wants to get out".

"The final line of dialogue: 'Let's stay, we still have our arms' was very significant. The question 'to stay – or to leave?' had a larger meaning."

"The key scene is the one where the fishermen try to catch the remains of a house by the seaside. It was a real thing, a real event, real scenery. The sea took so much. There is the old well which now looks like a chimney – things like that happened a lot. The dialogue concerns that key moment but is really also about something else, it is about the country which is like a shipwrecked people. The sequence of the people singing together in a very large circle has anthropological value."

"The Mudar de Vida score was composed by the Portuguese guitarist Carlos Paredes, our biggest ever guitar player, playing in the unique Portuguese style, different from the Spanish classical guitar."

"It is the portrait of a country, Portugal in the 1960s." (End of the José Manuel Costa introduction, notes by me).
...

A masterpiece, for me the finest discovery of this year's Midnight Sun Film Festival. With affinities with Visconti (La terra trema), Antonioni (Il grido), and Grémillon (Pattes Blanches), but fully original, a vision of landscapes familiar to the director Paulo Rocha since childhood, with contemporary relevance about a country in transition: facing a structural change from tradition to modernity, and from colonialism to liberation.

Mudar de Vida is a character-driven and a landscape-driven film. While the folkloristic value is great, the authentic detail is never decorative. The spirit of nobility and dignity is comparable to Visconti.

We have seen similar images of fishermen in films by Flaherty, Ruspoli, Perrault, and most recently by our own Kira Jääskeläinen, but Paulo Rocha has his own stark, rich approach in the scenes of the heavy boats being launched and trawls being pulled. "The sea is getting rougher, the catch is getting scarcer." The houses are collapsing by the seaside. There are no jobs in Portugal, and people are going to factories abroad.

The protagonist is a war invalid. He has experienced a severe jeep accident in the military service. His back is permanently injured, and he is no longer fit for heavy work in the trawlers. He faints, he falls ill.

There is a primitive chapel, a place of worship, and there Adelino meets for the first time Albertina, who has come to steal the collection (a connection with Risate di Gioia seen yesterday!). She works at a textile factory and has had an unhappy affair with an engineer. She has tried to commit suicide by jumping down a well. "I was born here but I'm a rolling stone. The world is a big place".

Also Julia has been suffering more than we can imagine (she has aged a lot in a few years), and on her deathbed she demands to be incinerated. "Make a huge bonfire on the beach, then forget".

The movie is about to become a story of fugitive lovers in the tradition of You Only Live Once and High Sierra, but Adelino and Albertina refuse to accept the outlaw status. They have nothing... except "a good pair of hands".

The cinematography by Elso Roque and Manuel Carlos da Silva is rich and powerful.

The print is superb.

Pour la suite du monde / For Those Who Will Follow

Pierre Perrault & Michel Brault: Pour la suite du monde / For Those Who Will Follow (CA 1963).

Of Whales, the Moon and Men / The Moontrap / For the Ones to Come. 

    CA 1963 © 1962 Office National du Film (Canada). PC: National Film Board of Canada (NFB), Office National du Film du Canada (ONF). La Société Radio-Canada et L'Office National du Film du Canada présentent. P: Jacques Bobet. Directeur de la production: Fernand Dansereau. 

    [Opening credits:] film de Pierre Perrault et de Michel Brault. [End credits:] Pierre Perrault, Michel Brault, Marcel Carrière ont fait ce film. SC: Pierre Perrault, Michel Brault – excerpts from Jacques Cartier: Relations (1545). DP: Michel Brault, Marcel Carrière, Pierre Perrault – assistant à la caméra: Bernard Gosselin - negative: 16 mm – release prints blown up to 35 mm – 1,37:1. M: Jean Cousineau (guitare), Jean Meunier (flûte). S: Pierre Lemelin, Ron Alexander, Roger Lamoureux (à la sonorisation et au mixage). Enregistrement des voix de Belugas (marsouins) ou Delphinapterus leucas: William E. Schevill (Institut oceanographique, Woods Hole, Mass. USA). ED: Werner Nold. Loc: Île-aux-Coudres (Québec, Canada). Commentary reader: Stanley Jackson. 

    Featuring: Léopold Tremblay (marchand et président de la Nouvelle société de la pêche aux marsouins / merchant and president of the new beluga fishing company), Alexis Tremblay (cultivateur and politicien / farmer and politician), Abel Harvey (capitaine et maître de pêche / captain and whaling master), Louis Harvey (cultivateur et chantre d'église / farmer and church cantor), Joachim Harve (capitaine du Nord de l'Île / captain of the Nord de l'Île). Les gens de l'Île aux Coudres ont vécu et joué les événements de ce film en 1962. 

    In French. 

    Not released in Finland

    [Short American version 84 min], 106 min. 

    A SFI Filmarkivet print of the 106 min version with electronic subtitles in Finnish by Lena Talvio at Cinema Orion, Helsinki (50 Years Ago), 23 May 2013

On-screen introduction: "Jusqu'en 1924, les habitants de l'Île aux Coudres tendaient une pêche aux marsouins sur le fleuve St-Laurent. À l'instigation des cinéastes, les gens de l'île ont "relevé la pêche" en 1962 pour en perpétuer la mémoire."

I saw this masterpiece of ethnofiction for the first time. Pierre Perrault, Michel Brault, and Marcel Carrière joined the community of Île aux Coudres in order to make a movie of the ancient tradition of beluga fishing by some 130 stakes erected on a shallow bay. It is a communal effort (we in Finland would call such an endeavour talkoot), the tradition goes back to the earliest days of the French inhabitation in 1535 and quite possibly to the ways of the original native inhabitants of the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

This is a movie about the community, the old and the young, the men and the women, the work and the leisure, the nature and the agriculture. Music is important, as is religion. The original Jacques Cartier reports from the New World in 1535–1545 have a prominent role, read aloud, the old French words visible on screen.

This non-fiction movie is an accurate record of many stages of traditional whaling, but most profoundly it is about the spirit of the community. It is about the joy of life the way they have discovered it.

The beautiful score is based on French-Canadian folk music with Jean Cousineau (guitar), Jean Meunier (flute), a female accordionist, a whistler, and impressive church chant by Abel Harvey.

Towards the conclusion we get to hear beluga sounds at the oceanographic institute. 

The beluga is not hunted for catch but for scientific study in whale conservation.

The language of the film might sometimes be difficult to understand even for a native French speaker. We were grateful for the fine electronic subtitles by Lena Talvio.

After the screening there was a memorable meeting at Corona Bar with Kira Jääskeläinen who has recently completed a whaling film of her own, Tagikaks (2012), Elizabeth Marschan, and Rauno Lauhakangas, a physicist, rock art specialist and international whale expert who has also participated in films such as Beluga Speaking Across Time (2002).

The visual quality: the movie has been shot on 16 mm and blown up to 35 mm. The print is clean and complete.

Legally online with excellent English subtitles: www.nfb.ca/film/pour_la_suite_du_monde_en/

Tampere Film Festival 2013: National Competition

Anastasia Lapsui & Markku Lehmuskallio: Yksitoista ihmisen kuvaa / 11 Images of a Human (FI 2012).

Tampere Film Festival is the oldest film festival in Finland. The complete official name of this year's edition is Tampere 43rd International Short Film Festival. Again I am focusing on the national competition. I copy below the official programme notes and add my own remarks having watched the films.

Subtitled in English and Finnish.

National Competition 1
Language: Arabic
HÄÄTANSSI
DANCE OF OUTLAWS

Bröllopsdansen
Finland, Norway | Suomi, Norja 2012
Documentary | 85 min | 2K DCP
Director: Mohamed El Aboudi
Script: Mohamed El Aboudi
Cinematography: Marita Hällfors
Sound: Martti Turunen
Editing: Erik Andersson
Music: Juuso Hannukainen, Mikko Rajala
Production: Illume Oy / Pertti Veijalainen, Timo Korhonen, Torstein Grude, Venla Hellstedt
Contact: Illume / Maarit Montonen, maarit.montonen@illume.fi
www.illume.fi
    A film about a woman who doesn't exist. Hind, a Moroccan girl, was raped and consequently denied an official identity. She has no other choice but to work as a prostitute and a traditional wedding dancer, but against the odds she refuses to give up.
    AA: Shot in Morocco, an astonishingly intimate documentary tragedy about an extremely sensitive situation. This movie belongs to the noble tradition of giving a voice to those who have been denied it. The camera is also a weapon of protection. In the presence of the camera people don't dare behave the way they would normally behave. The cinematography of Marita Hällfors is of high quality. Attention is paid to the atmosphere, the landscape, and the light. The colour palette is rich and warm.

National Competition 2
Language: ENG/FIN
YKSITOISTA IHMISEN KUVAA
11 IMAGES OF A HUMAN

Elva människobilder
Finland | Suomi 2012
Documentary | 80 min | 2K DCP
Directors: Anastasia Lapsui, Markku Lehmuskallio
Script: Anastasia Lapsui, Markku Lehmuskallio
Animation: Leena Jääskeläinen, Kaisa Penttilä
Cinematography: Johannes Lehmuskallio
Sound: Martti Turunen
Editing: Anastasia Lapsui, Markku Lehmuskallio
Music: Anna-Kaisa Liedes, Heikki Laitinen
Production, contact: Giron Filmi Oy / Markku Lehmuskallio, tel +358505292317, lapsui@mail.ru
    Kuvia kalliossa, kieltä mutta ei sanoja. Hän seisoo kokovartalokuvassa kallioon maalattuna, mutta kuka hän on? Sitä kukaan ei enää muista.
    Images in the rock, a language but no words. A full-length figure stands painted in the rock, but who is he or she? This no one can remember.
    AA: A new entry in Lehmuskallio and Lapsui's great, unique quest for the original, primordial thought and experience of man. This movie is a companion piece to Minä olen [I Am], and it is also related to Werner Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams. This is a film about visual expression before the concept of art. "I look at my double". This movie is a personal, subjective approach to ancient visual expressions, a series of attempts to identify with them, even with painting oneself, animation, singing, and breathing. The film is not pure non-fiction, but an engaged film with active participation. It is a kind of etno-fiction. The visual expressions are viewed at their original sites such as caves, and also in museums. - "The spirit in me paints the animal on the rock". The animals may be humans of previous generations. "He may be hunting his ancestor". - The continuity of prehistoric art today. Shaman drums, animal masks, shaman incantations. - Palimpsest style expressions of rapid movement. - The call of the hunter. - The mystery hands on the cave walls. - The Meandas deer on the Kola Peninsula. - The film-makers invite us inside the ancient images with all means at their disposal, even newsreel footage of a holy dance with digital animation inserts of spirits. - Cro-Magnon images: you need to learn to see. - If you don't know, you don't see. - Finding ancient images around the world: Niaux, the cave which is two kilometers deep, "into the womb of the Earth". - Verlankoski: ancient images of elks. - Del Rio, Texas. - Australia. - Lake Onega, Russian Karelia. - The myth of the Golden Age. - From the primitive weapon till the nuclear bomb.

National Competition 3
Language: FIN
HILTON! TÄÄLLÄ OLLAAN ELÄMÄ
HILTON!
Finland | Suomi 2013
Documentary | 74 min | 2K DCP
Director: Virpi Suutari
Script: Virpi Suutari
Cinematography: Heikki Färm
Sound: Olli Huhtanen
Editor: Jussi Rautaniemi
Music: Matti Pentikäinen, Arto Tuunela, Atso Soivio
Production, contact: Filmimaa Oy / Markku Tuurna, +358505666596, markku.tuurna@filmimaa.fi, www.filmimaa.fi
    Nuoret ajelehtijat asuvat itähelsinkiläistä vuokrataloa, jota he kutsuvat Hiltoniksi. Nuorilla ei ole koulutusta, työtä, luottotietoja. Hilton! kertoo viiden päähenkilön salatuista unelmista, ja elokuvasta kasvaa väkevä todistus ystävyyden voimasta.
    There is a block of rental flats in Eastern Helsinki suburbs called Hilton. Its inhabitants are school dropouts and various drifters. In Hilton! we share the secret dreams of the five protagonists and witness the power of true friendship.
    AA: This impressive movie I already saw at the DocPoint opening screening.

National Competition 4
Language: English mostly, Finnish also
ALCAN HIGHWAY
ALASKAN TIE
Finland | Suomi 2013
Documentary | 90 min | 2K DCP, scope
Director: Aleksi Salmenperä
Cinematography: Hena Blomberg
Sound: Pelle Venetjoki
Editor: Samu Heikkilä
Music: Ville Anselmi Tanttu
Production, contact: Made Oy / Ulla Simonen, +358409005505, ulla@made.fi, www.made.fi
    Elokuva kertoo miehestä, joka toteuttaa unelmansa: ystäviensä avulla hän yrittää korjata kuorma-auton, rakentaa sen päälle itselleen kodin ja ajaa sen Anchoragesta, Alaskasta Vancouverinsaarelle. Alcan Highway on road movie vapaudesta ja ystävyydestä.
    Alcan Highway is the story of a man making his dream come true: with the help of his friends he attempts to fix a truck, build a home on top of it and drive it from Anchorage, Alaska to the Vancouver Island. A road movie about freedom and friendship.
    AA: There seems to be a small revival of the road movie, including the film adaptation of Jack Kerouac's On the Road. Alcan Highway is a humoristic documentary account of a crazy project of Hese (Heikki Tolonen), building a unique mobile home, and driving 4000 kilometers from Anchorage to Vancouver Island. There is a sense of fun in the opening where the mobile home is built. There is an inner monologue about Hese's childhood: how he was forced to play the piano and engage in classical music. The explosion under the engine bonnet is the big crisis, but even this problem is solved. Spare parts are built on the road in an engine shop. Motto: "We find after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us" (John Steinbeck). A fine road movie score by Ville Anselmi Tanttu and his orchestra of seven players; their final tune is a nice interpretation of "Wheels" (Gram Parsons, Chris Hillman). The landscapes are magnificent in the scope images in the journey sections.

National Competition 5
SATTUMAN SYYT
FRAMES TELL THE STORY
HAZARDS [the English title on the print]
Language: ENG
Finland | Suomi 2012
Documentary | 47 min | blu-ray>file
Director: Virke Lehtinen
Screenplay: Virke Lehtinen
Animation: Virke Lehtinen
Cinematography: Virke Lehtinen
Sound: Hannu Koski
Editors: Tuuli Kuittinen, Juuso Lavonen
Production, contact: Filmiryhmä Oy / Virke Lehtinen, +358405026025, virke@filmiryhma.fi, www.filmiryhma.fi
    Sattuma ohjaa elämää. Sattumalta olen kuvannut tapahtumia, joihin en olisi halunnut joutua.
    Life happens by chance. By chance I have filmed situations I did not want to get into.
    AA: A film-maker's eloquent testimony. An excellent, personal essay by Virke Lehtinen based on footage shot him during fifty years. It starts with three dangerous accidents he has recorded with his camera. It goes on with three tragic stories of schoolmates. It expands the perspective to the world, to nature, to the universe. A work of lasting value with a special message to film archives. - The footage shot at the entrance of the KAVA vaults is about a then recent deposition by Virke Lehtinen, and the full story of the to-and-fro of that footage is quite complicated.

TAGIKAKS - ONCE WERE HUNTERS
TAGIKAKSI - OLIMME VALAANPYYTÄJIÄ
Language: Russian commentary, English subtitles
Finland | Suomi 2012
Documentary | 58 min | digibeta
Director: Kira Jääskeläinen
Screenplay: Kira Jääskeläinen
Cinematography: Timo Peltonen
Sound: Janne Jankeri
Editor: Katja Pällijeff
Music: Uno Helmersson
Production: Katharsis Films / Jouni Hiltunen
Contact: Katharsis Films / Kira Jääskeläinen, +358440270220, kira.jaaskelainen@gmail.com
    Kolja ja Sasha asuvat pienessä valaanpyytäjäyhteisössä Beringinsalmen rannalla. Heidän isänsä muistellessa vanhoja hyviä aikoja veljekset yrittävät löytää oman paikkansa nopeasti muuttuvassa maailmassa, jossa perinne kohtaa nykyajan.
    Kolya and Sasha live in a whale hunter community by the Bering Strait. While their father remembers the good old days the two brothers try to find their own paths in a rapidly changing world.
    AA: A leisurely account of the way of life in an arctic whaling community at Chukotka on the Russian side of the Bering Strait, where "the Ice Curtain" between Russia and the USA was located 25 years ago. Kira Jääskeläinen has managed to get very close to the people living in the extreme conditions that prevail there. Tagikaks belongs to one of the oldest traditions in the documentary cinema (Robert Flaherty, Mario Ruspoli, Pierre Perrault), but it is different, original, and unique. Dealing with corruption and gross mismanagement belongs to the themes of the movie. As do memories of the Soviet era. First towards the conclusion do we see the whale hunt. "If you lose control, that's the end of the story." In the cinematography I liked the majestic long shots of the stark landscapes.

National Competition 6
Language: FIN
LAULU KOTI-IKÄVÄSTÄ
FINNISH BLOOD SWEDISH HEART
Bilingual: in Finnish and Swedish
Finland, France, Germany, Sweden | Suomi, Ranska, Saksa, Ruotsi 2012
Documentary | 90 min | 2K DCP
Director: Mika Ronkainen 
    Nelikymppinen entinen muusikko Kai ajaa isänsä Taunon kanssa Oulusta Göteborgiin missä he asuivat Kain lapsuuden 70-luvulla. Pojan ja isän automatka muuttuu musiikilliseksi retkeksi yhteiseen tunnemuistiin ja suomalaissiirtolaisuuden historiaan.
    Kai, an ex-musician in his forties, drives with his father from Northern Finland to Southern Sweden where they lived in in the 1970's. The journey turns into a musical trip into the emotional memory and the history of Finnish immigration in Sweden.
    AA: Having lived three years in Sweden, myself, I have a personal interest in this original film about a quest for the roots of one's identity between Finland and Sweden. - Kai Latvalehto (in Aknestik 1984-2002) has had enough of Suomi rock. As he drives with his father from Oulu to Gothenburg (Göteborg) he learns things he never knew as a child in 1973, forty years ago: truths about moonshine liquor, being always drunk after work hours. There are Fenno-Swedish popular song performances every now and then, a sequence of a Swedish Finnish-language radio talk show, memories of inferior school circumstances for Finnish Swedes, views of traditional Finnish dancing spots in Sweden (Kai, the rock musician, has never danced on a dance floor). A Finnish Swedish woman says she had to work to find her identity, dramatized on the ferries sailing between Finland and Sweden. - Why am I an outsider? asks Kai. - In a discussion group he remembers embarrassing scenes from his childhood at the Pressbyrån stand in Gothenburg. - Kai still has a Swedish accent when he speaks Swedish. - Visiting the Slussen station, formerly an infamous spot of "Slussenin sissit", bums including Finns. - The powerful turning-point: the father tells about his vision / dream which made him stop drinking. - In Gothenburg Kai meets local rock guys who play Aknestik in their repertoire. - Destination Raggarkullen hill. - Father confesses that he had stolen money, and the move to Sweden made it possible to pay it back. - The spectacle of the Viking ferry leaving Stockholm for Finland. - The image of a green woodpecker as a present to the grandson from Gothenburg.

Music of Finnish immigrants of the 1970s was sung by Love Antell, Markus Fagervall, Mirella Hautala, Anna Järvinen, Darya Pakarinen, and Jukka Takalo. - Månskensorkestern. - Eskilstuna Boys.

National Competition 7
Language: ENG/FIN
BODY OF GOD
JUMALAN KEHO
Finland | Suomi 2013
Documentary | 79 min | digibeta
Director: Jouni Hokkanen
    Body of God kertoo siitä, kuinka 12-vuotiaan Fakir Musafarin 40-luvun alussa Etelä-Dakotassa suorittamista yksityisistä kokeiluista tuli maailmanlaajuinen ilmiö 90-luvun puoleenväliin mennessä.
    Body of God tells the story of how Fakir Musafar's private experiments on his body as a 12-year-old boy in South Dakota in early 1940s expanded to a worldwide phenomenon by the middle of the 1990s.
    AA: An amazing account of a lifetime in the culture of piercing. Fakir Musafar (born 1930) is eloquent about his experiences and the cultural links and connections. There is a lot of incredible vintage footage. New Guinea: tightlacing. The culture of tattooing. The Lakota sundance. The O-Kee-Pa ceremony: chest pierced (like in A Man Called Horse): "I saw the white light, and the white light spoke to me". In 1952 Queen Elizabeth inherited the crown jewels and had her ears pierced. I invented the name "modern primitives". The body piercing movement was started. Fakir's piercing school. Aerosmith: Crazy video with Alicia Silverstone started the piercing fashion. The African warrior tradition of branding. With internet we found one another. The question of body modification vs. mutilation / amputation.

National Competition 8
AAMULLA VIEMME LAPSET METSÄÄN
OUT INTO THE WOODS
Finland | Suomi 2012
Documentary | 12 min | 2K DCP
Director: Jussi Lehtomäki
    Olipa kerran puunhakkaaja, joka asui kahden lapsensa ja vaimonsa kanssa tuvassa metsän laidassa. Pojan nimi oli Hannu, tytön Kerttu. Onko tämä Grimmin satu tuttu? Elokuva vie katsojan sadunkerrontahetkeen ja lähettää matkalle vanhaan metsään.
    Once upon a time a woodcutter lived with his wife and two children in a cottage next to a forest. The boy was called Hansel, the girl Gretel. Do you know this old story by the brothers of Grimm? The movie sends the audience on a journey into the dark woods.
    AA: A short film of prestige and ambition. Hansel and Gretel as a multi-meta-essay: the fairy-tale told straight, seen as silhouette animation, illustrated in live action and landscape footage, and discussed in circles of grown-up women and senior people. There are also visions of desolation and alienation. Cinematographer: Hannu Kähi. "Tuu tuu tupakkarulla" perf. Maija Kauhanen, kantele. "Nuku, nuku" perf. Sari Kaasinen & Sirmakka.

IN MEMORIAM
MUISTOKSI
Finland | Suomi 2013
Experimental | 7 min | file
Director: Niina Suominen
    In Memoriam kuvaa ihmiselämän hetkellisyyttä. Elokuva yhdistää autioituneiden talojen kuvat ja huutokaupan äänet, muodostaen meditaation siitä, mitä meistä jää jäljelle kun poistumme näyttämöltä.
    In Memoriam addresses the transience of life. Images of desolate houses and sounds from an auction combine to form a meditation on what will be left of us when we have left the stage.
    AA: Soundtrack: a humoristic barker at full fling at an auction; rhythmic electronic dance music. Images: a montage of abandones houses.

HANKIKANTO
SHE HAS YOUR EYES
Finland | Suomi 2012
Fiction | 20 min | blu-ray>file
Director: Katja Niemi
    Abortti.
    Abortion.
    AA: It is winter, and the town is snowbound. The movie is a subjective vision from the viewpoint of a young woman (Manuela Bosco) who is expecting. The young couple is at their morning routines. She meets a young mother with her baby. "I haven't told him yet". Visiting a shop for baby matters. The beginning is edited normally, then there is a Roy Andersson shot at the abortion clinic. Handheld camera for the consultation with the doctor about the abortion. Extended realistic hospital footage from a discreet camera angle. She is given tablets for the abortion. She walks out in a trance. Throughout the movie she is casting glances at children. Blood on the floor of the shower cabinet. Her envious gaze at a mother with her baby. Blurred vision to express her confusion. Extreme close-ups of her feet as she trudges slowly in deep snow in the forest. Handheld camera for a celebration (birthday?) with a piece of cake decorated with a firecracker. At night, is it a nightmare?, she walks to the bathroom and meets a dog grimacing in a pool of blood. She collects the remains of the aborted fetus, buries them in the forest, and puts the tiny mittens on top.

MY BABY DON'T LOVE ME
MUN KULTA EI RAKASTA MUA
Finland | Suomi 2012
Animation | 4 min | blu-ray>file
Director: Heta Jäälinoja
    Heräsin tänä aamuna. Jäljellä ei ole mitään muuta kuin tilkka kahvia.
    Woke up this morning. There's nothing left but a hint of coffee.
    AA: Animation in stark Priit Pärn style. A black bird leaves the empty room of a man who wakes up alone. He produces a shotgun to get the bird. An old lady and a young black guy dance to a shellac record. Robert Johnson: "Kind Hearted Woman", "Drunken Hearted Man", "Love In Vain".

VEM PLOCKAR UPP SKÄRVOR AV ETT SPRUCKET JAG
QUEEN OF SPLINTERS
MINUUTENI SIRPALEET
In Swedish
Finland | Suomi 2012
Documentary | 15 min | dvd>file
Director: Anna-Sofia Nylund
    ”En ole ollut rakastunut yhteenkään elämäni mieheen. En tiedä mitä rakkaus on.” 66-vuotias nainen tarkastelee elämäänsä. Näemme muistojen muovautuvan outojen yökerhokokemusten ja vieraiden miesten kanssa vietettyjen hotelliöiden kautta. Ne eivät ole suoneet kokijalleen minkäänlaista lohtua tai turvaa. Taiteilija Pauliina Turakka Purhosen räsynuket esittävät naista viisi-, kolme- ja kuusikymmenvuotiaana.
    "I've never been in love with any of the men in my life. I don't know what love is". A 66-year-old woman looks back on her life. Through odd experiences at nightclubs and with strangers in hotel rooms, we see memories take shape. Memories that have left their bearer with no comfort nor safety. The artist Pauliina Turakka Purhonen's rag dolls illustrate the woman as a five-, thirty- and sixty-year-old.
    AA: The intimate confessions of a whore (that's the word she uses herself). Three rag doll images of a naked, battered woman illustrate the confessions in a general way. Queen theme tune. "I have lived like an animal". "Who I love are my children and grand-children". "My wing is broken but I'm not defeated". "At the age of five I was sexually abused by a bus driver. In those days we were not supposed to talk about such things. But it has haunted me all my life." Raped by a group of four Norwegian men. I got to alcohol to ease the pain. That was the quickest consolation. There was no safety anywhere.

MUSTA JOULU
BLACK CHRISTMAS
Finland | Suomi 2012
Fiction | 20 min | file
Director: Juuso Räsänen
    Etiopialaisella maahanmuuttajalla Samuelilla on maailman kiittämättömin työ – hän työskentelee Suomessa joulupukkina osaamatta lainkaan kieltä. Perttilän perheen isä on tehnyt kriittisen virheen ja unohtanut tilata pukin aatoksi. Viime hetkellä hän tavoittaa yhden vapaan joulupukin – Samuelin. Ensin hänen saapumisensa aiheuttaa huvittavan kiusallisia tilanteita, mutta vähitellen perhe alkaa lämmetä ja antaa tulokkaalle mahdollisuuden. Takaako se siltikään onnistunutta iltaa?
   Ethiopian immigrant Samuel has the most ungrateful job in the world – he works as a Santa Claus in Finland and doesn’t speak the language. The father of the Perttilä family has made a crucial mistake, he's forgotten to order a Santa for Christmas Eve. In the last minute he gets hold on the last free Santa – Samuel. At first the arrival of Samuel causes uncomfortably humorous situations but little by little the family starts to warm up and gives a newcomer a chance. But is that still a guarantee for a night to be a success?
    AA: An assured satire on the embarrassment of racism. And an Aki Kaurismäki parody? Christmas Eve. A black guy (Dave Rukeratabaro) as Santa Claus at the door of an ageing couple (Aake Kalliala, Kristiina Elstelä). Green marmelade balls are their treat. Nokia Lumia. The last Santa left at the Santa exchange is the black guy. Even the switchboard operator is speaking Finnish with a foreign (Russian?) accent. The second destination (Petteri Summanen, Minttu Mustakallio, expecting): the family is amazed at the black guy. The glögi (Glühwein) stains Santa's gear, and he is invited into the sauna. The emphasis is on quiet moments of embarrassment. Sauna beer. Christmas dinner. "Thank you, I eat no pig." "I am an Ethiopian Jew". He produces the green marmelade balls. Sister is Catholic, no presents at Christmas. My mother is from Congo. Sings a song of her mother from Congo. Next year, the black guy is a Christmas guest, and the mother has baby twins. Santa now is an Asian guy. "World Around You" perf. by Rubik.

FARUZA
In Kurdish, this version with an English commentary
Finland / Czech Republic | Suomi / Tshekin tasavalta 2011
Animation | 21 min | file
Director: Katariina Lillqvist
    Faruza on keskiaikainen tarina eristetystä saarivaltakunnasta, jonka hallitsijat loivat aikoinaan ankaran lain: jokaisen yli kaksitoistavuotiaan neidon oli lukittava kasvoilleen raskas, kuparista taottu naamio jota kannettiin hautaan asti.
    Faruza is a medieval story of an isolated island kingdom, where the rulers abide by a strict law: the women must wear a copper mask from the day they turn twelve until the day they die.
    AA: A beautiful puppet animation with a rich and juicy colour palette. The theme: the prison of womanhood - symbolized by the copper mask - and the traditional wedding gown. How can anyone escape her destiny? The rebellion of Faruza, the desperation of the blacksmith. He forges a bird out of the mask. Faruza obtains the key with which she can open all the copper masks of the oppressed women. "I wanted to finally see the face of my own dear mother." Faruza is caught, but the rebellion expands into the royal court. "Since then our harbours have been open to all the ships in the world". A beautiful score.

National Competition 9

HÄNEN TILANNE
Finland | Suomi 2012
Animation | 7 min | file
Director: Jenni Rahkonen
    Hän lakkaa pyörimästä maapallon mukana.
    The world won't stop turning even when one stops turning with it.
    AA: Limited animation: stark black lines on white. The guy remains on his place while the globe turns around under him. The coffin, too keeps turning with the Earth. Priit Pärn style characters. Speech bubbles. Black birds with heads upside down. The man grabs a tree, and the Earth's turning grinds to a halt for a while.

HÄIVÄHDYS ELÄMÄÄ
Finland | Suomi 2012
Documentary | 6 min | 2K DCP
Director: Hannes Vartiainen, Pekka Veikkolainen
    Rautatieasemalla tuntemattomien matkaajien elämänpolut kohtaavat. Virtaavan ihmismassan pyörteistä erottuu häivähdyksenomaisia hetkiä kulkijoiden elämänkohtaloista.
    Brief moments of life stolen from passing-by strangers form a sequence of events hidden in plain sight.
    AA: Experimental cinema: electronic static and distortions as forms of expression. Figurative, representational images emerge from the static. Waltz music, carousel associations, and steam engine references on the soundtrack.

CHANSON DU SOLEIL
WHERE IS FRANK [title on screen]
LAULUSI SUN
Finland | Suomi 2012
Fiction | 17 min | dvd>file
Director: Sakari Lerkkanen
    Kaunis tarina ystävyydestä. Kaksi muusikkoa on soittaneet jo vuosia yhdessä. Eräänä aamuna toinen muusikoista on kadonnut. Mykkäelokuva, jonka musiikista vastaa Puhallinorkesteri Oktaavi.
    A beautiful story about a friendship. Two musicians have played music together every morning for years. One morning other one disappears! A silent film where the music is performed by the symphony orchestra Puhallinorkesteri Oktaavi.
    AA: A trombone player and a guitar player. Laconic images with sunlit scenes and dark night scenes alternating. A music driven movie. The dialogue and the thoughts appear in spare intertitles. The quest for the lost trombone playing friend.

THINGS FOLD INTO THEMSELVES
YÖNÄYTÖS
Finland | Suomi 2012
Experimental | 5 min | file
Director: Arttu Nieminen
    Mökin ikkunasta näemme upean öisen hetken, ja kun kurkistamme ulkoa sisään, jokin yhtä ihmeellinen kirkastaa talon. Yläpuolellamme kiihdytetyt revontulet jäljittelevät vettä, joka yhdistää maan ja tähdet.
    We look out a cabin window on a glorious night scene, then peer in from outside as something just as spectacular brightens the house. Above, the sped-up northern lights mimic water, connecting earth and stars.
    AA: Electronic rhythm music score. Time lapse imagery. Extreme low camera angles towards treetops. Moths circling lights at night. Mirror effects. Jump cuts. Nature magic. Magnificent northern lights. Human forms as warmly glowing figures in time lapse in the cabin.

SIROCCO
Finland | Suomi 2012
Fiction | 15 min | 2K DCP
Director: Mikko Kuparinen
    Miten käy, kun yksinäinen nainen löytää vauvan roskiksesta, eikä kerro kenellekään vaan päättää pitää vauvan itse?
    What happens when a lonely woman finds a baby in the dumpster, doesn’t tell anybody and decides to keep the baby herself?
    AA: Revisited Sirocco, Mikko Kuparinen's adaptation of Tuuve Aro's short story "Merkki". A movie with minimal dialogue. I now noticed the participation of the Autism and Asperger Association.

KEHÄ
Finland | Suomi 2013
Experimental | 3 min | file
Director: Sini Liimatainen, Azar Saiyar
    Maanantaiaamusta perjantai-iltaan.
    From Monday morning to Friday evening.
    AA: The sound of the Baltic ferry. The sea, gray. On the soundtrack remarks such as: "Time just seems to run out". "It all happens so fast". Quick flashes of landscapes, city and forest. A sound image of race car driving. Speed and acceleration. Electronic music score. A montage of voices, with remarks about perpetual hurry.

KYRKOGÅRDSÖ
In Swedish.
Switzerland, Finland | Sveitsi, Suomi 2012
Documentary | 24 min | 2K DCP
Director: Joakim Chardonnens
    Kyrkogårdsö on pieni saari keskellä Itämerta. Tämä kahdeksan asukkaan saari on kuulunut Nordbergin perheelle kuudentoista sukupolven ajan. Joka aamu pieni 5-vuotias Ida Nordberg ylittää koulumatkallaan jäätyneen meren. Kyrkogårdsö kyseenalaistaa lapsen ja häntä ympäröivän voimallisen ja äärettömän luonnon välisen suhteen.
    Kyrkogårdsö, a small island in the middle of the Baltic Sea. This island of eight inhabitants has belonged to the Nordberg family for 16 generations. Every morning, the little Ida Nordberg, 5 years old, is crossing the icy sea to go to school. Kyrkogårdsö is a movie questioning the relation between a child and the immensity and power of the landscape.
    AA: A slow, deliberate, and atmospheric look at life in harsh circumstances in the Swedish-speaking Baltic Sea archipelago. Views of winter, snow and ice on the Baltic Sea. The sky is overcast. The sunlight is bleak. The sun looks like the moon beyond the clouds. There is a distant barking of a dog. Ida (5) at the breakfast table. Taken with an all-terrain vehicle to boat that will take her to the school. The sea passage. The children play on board. No dialogue during the first 12 minutes. - The dominant view: the little human figure in the overwhelming, desolate landscape.

National Competition 10
TREFFIT
THE DATE
Finland | Suomi 2012
Fiction | 8 min | 2K DCP
Director: Jenni Toivoniemi
    Tinon, 16, miehisyys on koetuksella Mirkan, 25, ja Lissun, 54, edessä, kun hän joutuu isännöimään perheen kollikissan treffejä.
    Tino’s (16) manhood is put to test in front of two women, Mirka (25) and Lissu (54) when he has to host a date for Diablo, the family’s stud cat.
    AA: Mirka is shocked at what happens to their virgin cat bitch, but Tino assures her that Diablo the tomcat is patient and experienced.

AJATUKSIA KUOLEVAISUUDESTA
THOUGHTS ABOUT DYING
Finland | Suomi 2012
Fiction | 7 min | 2K DCP
Director: Jani Ilomäki
    Poika miettii, mitä kuolema on.
    A boy ponders death.
    AA: A little boy learns from his parents that Jaska the old and sickly bobtailer has to be put out. The boy's thoughts are visualized and literalized in an exaggerated cartoon fashion with horror movie influences. Bold, stylized, inventive. Who really knows what death is. The Goth sisters adds her own remarks to the boy's confused mix. What is emptiness? The universe. Inserts of abstract cinema. A man in an armour buys canned goods. A caveman visits the supermarket. Second Chance insurance company. If war comes I can die at home. No signal. - When the family is about to leave to the veterinarian there is a car crash.

HAPPY HOUR
Finland | Suomi 2012
Documentary | 10 min | 2K DCP
Director: Lotta-Kaisa Riistakoski
    ”Jos mie lopettaisin juomisen, niin se on sama kuin vetäisin itseni jojon jatkoksi.” Tarinoita sammumattoman janon maasta.
    ”If I quit drinking, I might as well go and hang myself.” Tales from the land of a thousand drinks.
    AA: Soundtrack: monologue of drinkers. Images: ranging from the desolate walls and views of an alcoholic's apartment to serene views of swan lakes. Drinking songs performed by a beautiful female choir and others: "If all the lakes of Finland would turn to liquor". Another drinker: a season drinker who drinks in the summer only. Third man: a Saturday drinker while watching YouTube. "We'll drink like there's no tomorrow". Fourth man: I never picked up a woman while sober, and I have picked up many. Fifth, a woman: you are not alone when you drink. Alcohol has a central role in our society. Kids may not see me drunk. Sixth: sobriety gives an overdose of normality. It gets to the point that it does not matter what happens. No wallet, no phone, no bag. I passed out in a park. End of the world. I took several days off.

METSÄNPEITTO
COVERED BY FOREST
Finland | Suomi 2012
Documentary | 21 min | 2K DCP
Director: Salla Hämäläinen
    Markku on nähnyt lapsesta asti metsänhenkiä ja kokenut henkien liittävän hänet yhdeksi metsän kanssa. Hänen kokemuksiaan pidettiin lapsekkaan mielikuvituksen tuotteena, ja hän tunsi itsensä erilaiseksi. Hän halusi vain olla metsässä eikä sopeutunut hyvin normaaliin elämään. Hänen on aina palattava arkeen, mutta tällä kertaa hän löytää seuraa, jonka kanssa jakaa rakkautensa luontoa kohtaan.
    Already as a child Markku started to see nature spirits and he had an experience of being merged to the forest by the spirits. His experiences were considered as mere childish imagination and he felt different. He only longed to be in the forest and had difficulties to adapt to normal life. He always has to return to normal life but this time he finds a companion to share his love for the nature.
    AA: Images: visions of the forest, also in soft focus and extreme close-up. Sound: a first person confession of the pantheist. "I felt one with nature". "A web of energy descended upon me, and I felt incredibly good." "I did not want to go anywhere". A cave. A rock by the lake. Flute music. Long shots and full shots with the shaman-looking Markku wandering in the forest. "When you acquire the forest nose you always long for the forest." The deeper reality. The poisonous cowbane. "My earliest memory is a lighting that struck our home". "Then I realized the spirits: elves and fairies". Extreme low angle shot towards the treetops. A switch to the winter, the snow-covered forest. "Since my young age I felt estranged from regular life. Later I tried to conform to the mold. I felt ill doing so." Markku has found a woman, Veera. She approaches on ski. They discuss forest birds and flying squirrels. The forest cover is also a tantric path. When you find the right person. Markku gives a massage by the fire in the snowy forest. Swimming in the lake. Time lapse images of clouds.

OSUMIA JA HUTEJA
HITS AND MISSES
Finland | Suomi 2012
Animation | 13 min | file
Director: Kai Lappalainen
    Kamarianimaatio vallasta ja kansasta.
    A chamber animation about authority and the people.
    AA: Digital animation starting with black silhouette figures on white. Little figures and a huge ball. Black birds. Colour appears. Visions of industry. Towers of smoke and black birds. Black human figures fall from the smoke towers. Corridors of power. There is no meaningful dialogue, only sounds simulating speech. The big boss falls and transforms into a mass of little figures. The black birds cries.

METSÄ ON NUORI JA TÄYNNÄ ELÄMÄÄ
THE FOREST IS YOUNG AND FULL OF LIFE
Finland | Suomi 2013
Experimental | 29 min | file
Director: Jaana Kokko
    Elokuva koostuu kahdesta rinnakkaisesta keskustelusta, jotka edustavat erilaisia näkökulmia. Fiktiivinen ja faktuaalinen aineisto nivoutuvat yhteen muodostaen kokonaisuuden, joka kuvaa kaupunkilaisten suhdetta eläimiin, luontoon ja rakennettuun ympäristöön.
    The film consists of parallel conversations representing different perspectives. The fictive and factual material weave together to form a whole that sheds light on urban people’s relationship to animals, nature and the built environment.
    AA: An essay on man and nature - on our estrangement from nature. The first shot is from the Natural History Museum of Helsinki. A man: how all the trees in the forest are finished. The commentary is in verse. There is no untouched space. There are fragments of space. A woman: I don't know if I exist.

National Competition 11
HILJAISEN TALVEN LAPSI
THE CHILD OF A SILENT WINTER
Finland | Suomi 2012
Documentary | 22 min | 2K DCP
Director: Iiris Härmä
    Katja on nuori eläkeläinen ja turhautunut. 24-vuotiaana hän elää yksinäisyyden vankilassa, jossa päivät kuluvat koiraa ulkoiluttaen ja ikkunasta katsellen. Jos on hiljaa, niin kukaan ei välitä eikä auta. Ahdistaa ja pelottaa, tätäkö elämä on.
    Katja is a young retiree and frustrated. At 24, she is living in a circle of solitude, spending her days walking her dog and looking out of the window. Her loneliness stems from years of being the victim of school bullying.
    AA: The movie starts with colourful crayon-drawn images and a reflection of Katja. Voiceover: the first person account of Katja. "I often feel frustrated." Superimposed images of Katja moving around in her room like a ghost. The account of the school bullying. The parents did not protect Katja. "I just tried to hold on. I did not dare go out. That way I got isolated." Father has been diagnozed as a schizophrenic. Mother is trembling, living under constant anguish and insecurity. "Mother tried to chase me out with the other kids". Katja in a bread line, the food bank. "I am unable to defend myself against the authorities. They are always testing. I think the group is repulsive". Visiting the Advent Church. "There I seem to have found some friends". I have an ache in my bones. Not arthritis. The pain comes from inside my bones. "Many find me mentally ill". "I often think that I would just like to get out of this world. I have nothing to lose". - "We all die one day". - "Thank God". - "My colourings are like scars. They express what I might have become. I escape my gloom into colour". - Making the braids. - "What is your family now?" - "Just the dog and me". - "I need to avoid a life like my mother's". - There are over 50.000 marginalized young people in Finland. 5% of the generation. Every day, five people under 30 become retired.

LEARNING TO FISH
KUINKA PYYDYSTETÄÄN KALA?
Ireland | Irlanti 2012
Animation | 4 min | 2K DCP | scope
Director: Teemu Auersalo
    Kesän mentyä kaupunkilokki Johnnyn on opeteltava pyytämään kalaa. Learning to Fish pohtii tietämättömyyttä ja piittaamattomuutta ruoan alkuperästä. Elokuva kertoo henkiinjäämistaitojen unohtamisesta ja halusta löytää nuo taidot uudelleen.
    When the summer is over, Johnny the urban seagull has to learn to catch fish. Learning to Fish is a reflection on not knowing and not caring where our food comes from. It's a film about the loss of basic survival skills and about the desire to find those instinctive skills again.
    AA: Digital animation, stark stylization, simple figures, bold colours. The spoiled city seagulls are in trouble after the holiday season.

ESKAPISTIT
THE ESCAPISTS
Finland | Suomi 2012
Fiction | 12 min | 2K DCP | scope
Director: Niklas Lindgren
    Villellä on uusi harrastus: larppaus, jota hän sekä rakastaa että häpeää. Kun Villen suuri ihastus ehdottaa tapaamista, päättää Ville salata larppaamisen tältä. Treffit etenevät silti katastrofaalisesti, kunnes Ville saa apua yllättävältä taholta.
    Ville has a new hobby: larping, which he loves, even though he knows it´s not cool. When the girl of his dreams wants to meet him, Ville decides to keep his new hobby to himself. The date is nevertheless a disaster, until Ville gets help from an unexpected ally.
    AA: A comic story about live action role playing (larping) vs. dating. Loc: Kapteeninpuistikko. Having to hide the hobby from the girlfriend Asta who is at the Toveri. Asta has Googled Ville. But Ville lies blatantly about his hobby. The lies go on as a larping friend happens to meet him. Facebook reveals everything. But Asta is also an Escapist. Ville dons a Viking gear and abducts Asta. Niko Taskinen, Anna Paavilainen, Samuli Niittymäki, Antti Luusuaniemi.

TWO ISLANDS
SAARET
Language: English.
Finland | Suomi 2012
Experimental | 7 min | 2K DCP
Director: Jan Ijäs
    Elokuva kahdesta valtavasta jätevuoresta New Yorkissa. Ensimmäinen on nyt jo suljettu tavallinen jätevuori, joka oli aikanaan maailman suurin. Toinen on tuntemattomien hautausmaa, ja edelleen toiminnassa.
    Two Islands – Staten Island & Hart Island, NYC is a film about two enormous waste dumps in NYC. The first one is now closed, an ordinary waste dump, which at one point was the largest in the world. The other is a cemetery of unknowns, still in use.
    AA: Black and white footage on the giant waste dump and the cemetery of unknowns (one million people). Four times a week there is a death patrol, a ferry which brings newly dead. Baby Gonzales, age: five minutes. - Colour footage: typewriters, office chairs, potato peels, nail clippers, shoes, hospital waste. The largest human-built monument in the U.S. 890 hectares. One hundred million tons. The most important archeological treasure. The only human construction that can be seen from outer space.

KAKARA
THE BRAT
Finland | Suomi 2013
Fiction | 13 min | file
Director: Kimmo Yläkäs
    Mies raahaa tyttöystävänsä sairaalaan tekemään aborttia. Kakaraa tässä nyt viimeksi tarvitaan. Mieli voi kuitenkin muuttua sairaalan naistentautien odotusaulassa.
    Man drags his girlfriend to hospital for an abortion. A brat is a last thing needed right now. But sitting in a waiting room can change your mind.
    AA: In medias res. The man (Antti Luusuaniemi) is incredibly impatient, abrupt, abrasive, and rude. He tries to command the hospital staff. He bullies the fellow customers in the waiting space until he is alone. A child plays hockey ball and refuses to be intimidated. There is a playground downstairs. The man hits the ball several times and hurts the child. "You did not score". The man has a biker vest with initials. The brat passes out, and the bully helps her. He holds hockey night tickets. Meanwhile, the wife has left.

SOMMA SOMMARUM
Finland | Suomi 2012
Documentary | 30 min | blu-ray > file
Director: Vesa Kuosmanen
    Ossi Somma, 87, joutui vakavaan auto-onnettomuuteen 1960-luvulla. Onnettomuus jätti häneen fyysisiä jälkiä, mutta vaikutti vielä voimakkaammin hänen taiteeseensa. Palkittu nuori kuvanveistäjä muutti pieneen suomalaiseen kylään toteuttaakseen erikoista, kiisteltyä taidettaan. Vuosien saatossa hän on rakentanut valtavan veistospuiston. Ossin vaimo Sinikka jätti kaiken taakseen ja omisti elämänsä miehensä auttamiselle.
    Ossi Somma, 87, was in a serious car accident in the 1960s. The accident left physical marks on him but even more impact it had on his art. The celebrated young sculptor moved to a small Finnish town and started making very odd controversial art there. During the years he has build a massive sculpture park. Sinikka left everything behind and devoted her life helping Ossi.
    AA: The location: Siuro. The subject: the sculpture park of Ossi Somma (born 1926). - "The people who starved to death are in heaven, the greedy languish in hell". - "War of images". - Concentration camp graves. - Macabre figures of horror, images of people who have starved to death. - Dante was lost in the dark forest, and we are lost in the dark forest of commodities. - We have to cut down our consumption, otherwise this is the end. - Dante's path to Hell is recreated in the forest park. Its construction goes on. It's about greed and indifference. It's an installation about the state of the Earth. - Pier Paolo Pasolini: consumer fascism is contemporary fascism. - Rain forests, desertification, child labour, suffering of animals. - Sinikka is losing her eyesight. She can only listen to the landscape. - Exhibition: Sokea sokeaa taluttaa / A blind one walking another blind one. - The Forgotten Soul. - A chair is for me a symbol for the commodity and for power. - In 1960 many of my friends died in a car accident. I was unconscious for four days. Sculpting was hard work and helped me take my thoughts out of the accident. Previously, I was a traditionalist. - Working hours and methods. - Many work for money, but there are many of us who think otherwise, as well.