The Adventures of Woody Woodpecker 2

Nakke Nakuttajan seikkailuja 2 / Hacke Hackspätt på äventyr 2. US (c) 1956-1958 Universal International. PC: Walter Lantz Productions. D: Paul J. Smith. SC: Jack Cosgriff, Homer Brightman. M: Clarence E. Wheeler. Technicolor. Vintage prints with full, bright, beautiful colour but with "rain" and joins in starts and tails. Viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 9 September 2008.
Crazy "cartunes" featuring the irrepressible woodpecker.
Chief Charlie Horse (1956). Cigar store Indian mixed with the real thing.
Get Lost (1956). Baby woodpeckers challenge a hungry cat.
Woodpecker from Mars (1956). Woody in a tv space costume mistaken for a Martian.
Dopey Dick the Pink Whale (1957). Moby Dick parody.
Fodder and Son (1957). Bears as park bums do the poor beggar act and Elvis imitations.
International Woodpecker (1957). Woody's history of the world, mayhem at every turning point.
Misguided Missile (1957). The insurance salesman with an intelligent missile to help with claims.
Round Trip to Mars (1957). Woody on holiday disturbed by a rocket scientist.
The Unbearable Salesman (1957). Woody the salesman meets a bear set for hibernation.
Everglade Raid (1958). Woody meets alligator. Alligator sees dinner, Woody sees luggage.

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

Casper Wrede: One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich / En dag i Ivan Denisovitsj' liv (GB/NO 1970)

Päivä Ivan Denisovitshin elämässä / Ivan Denisovitshin päivä / En dag i Ivan Denisovitsj' liv. 

    GB/NO 1970. PC: Group W Films LLC / Leontes / Norsk Film. 

    P+D: Casper Wrede. SC: Ronald Harwood - based on the novella Один день Ивана Денисовича (1962) by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn - Finnish translation Ivan Denisovitshin päivä (1962) by Markku Lahtela. DP: Sven Nykvist - Eastmancolor. Starring Tom Courtenay (Ivan Denisovich Shukhov). 

    Original in English. 

    105 min. 

    Vintage print without subtitles imported by JD Productions / Jörn Donner, deposited by him to the Finnish Film Archive.

    In 1972 the film was banned in Finland ("screening this film may harm the nation's relations with foreign powers") at VET, LTK and KHO.

    First screening at the Finnish Film Archive, at Orion, Helsinki, 9 Dec 1993.

    Finnish telepremiere 27 Oct 1996 Yle TV1.

    Memorial screening of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1918-2008) in the presence of the Wrede family in Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 8 September 2008.

A fine print with colour intact.

Casper Wrede's film had no premiere in Finland, as it was banned during the Cold War.

We have shown One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich before, and today I revisited the first reel. It shows the morning of the day in the grim Stalinist concentration camp after WWII, Ivan Denisovich's sickness, the appalling food.

I remember first having read Solzhenitsyn at the age of 16 in 1971, it was The First Circle. Solzhenitsyn's books had been published so far in the most prestigious books series, the Yellow Library of the Tammi company. Reading Solzhenitsyn was very moving, but I knew about the Gulag already from other books, even from left-wing memoirs, and the theme was well represented in the media, particularly in the main newspaper Helsingin Sanomat. The banning of the film was ludicrous, an insult to the liberty of freedom and it certainly contributed to a general hatred of the Soviet Union.

In the 1970s Solzhenitsyn's most famous book, The Gulag Archipelago, was not published in Finnish by Tammi but by Wahlström & Widstrand in Stockholm (the first volume) and Kustannuspiste in Tampere (the rest). It was easily available in Finland.

It has been stated that Solzhenitsyn's books contributed decisively to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Certainly so, but as Solzhenitsyn's books focused on the crimes of the Stalin era, also officially condemned by the USSR, one might add that the persecution, banning and exile of Solzhenitsyn weighed even more.

The noble Wrede family dates to 13th century Germany, and since the 17th century it has been prominent in Finland.

The age of political bans of films in Finland ended with the glasnost of the USSR in the 1980s - with the end of the Cold War. During the Cold War, Finland played a part bigger than its size in détente, most importantly in the SALT (Strategic Arms Limitation Talks) commenced in Helsinki in 1969 and the CSCE (Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe) process which led to he Helsinki Agreement in 1975. The Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not want to endanger these processes.

Finnish film censorship was abolished in 2001.

...

SUOMEN ELOKUVA-ARKISTO 

FINLANDS FILMARKIV

PROGRAM NOTE BY SAKARI TOIVIAINEN

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

En dag i Ivan Denisovitsj' liv

Ivan Denisovitshin päivä / [Päivä Ivan Denisovitshin elämässä]

 

Norja / Iso-Britannia 1970. Tuotantoyhtiö: Leontes Films (Lontoo), Norsk Film (Oslo), Group W Films. Tuottaja: Caspar Wrede. Ohjaus: Caspar Wrede. Käsikirjoitus: Ronald Harwood – Gillon Aitkenin käännös Aleksandr Solzhenitsynin romaanista (1963, suom. Ivan Denisovitshin päivä). Kuvaus: Sven Nykvist. Lavastus: Per Schwab. Musiikki: Arne Nordheim. Leikkaus: Thelma Connell. Pääosissa: Tom Courtenay (Ivan Denisovitsh), Espen Skjonberg (Tjurin), James Maxwell (kapteeni Buinovski), Alfred Burke (Aljosha), Eric Thompson (Tsezar), John Cording (Pavlo), Matthew Guinness (Kilgas), Alf Malland (Fetjukov), Friman Falck Clausen (Senka), Jo Skjonberg (Goptshik), Odd Jan Sandsdalen (Eino), Torstein Rustdal (Vaino), Paul Connell. Elokuva kiellettiin Suomessa aluksi tuoreeltaan (KHO) – televisiolähetys: 27.10.1996 TV1 – VET 80422 – original in English – 2890 m / 105 min

 

Vuonna 1945 Aleksandr Solzhenitzyn joutui poliittisen ilmiannon uhriksi ja hänet tuomittiin kahdeksaksi vuodeksi vankileirille ja lisäksi kahden vuoden karkotukseen. Vuoden 1956 puoluekokouksen jälkeen hänet rehabilitoitiin ja osana Hrushtshevin kesken jäänyttä destalinisointikampanjaa hän sai julki vankileirikokemuksiinsa perustuvan esikoisteoksensa Ivan Denisovitshin päivä, joka ensin ilmestyi liberaalissa Novyi Mir –lehdessä 1963. Solzhenitsyn sai kirjallisuuden Nobel-palkinnon 1970: kaikki julkisuus ja kirjailijan nousu ihmisoikeustaistelun keulakuvaksi johtivat siihen, että Solzhenitsyn karkotettiin Neuvostoliitosta maanpakoon ja on palaamassa Venäjälle vasta vuoden 1994 kuluessa.

Suomalaissyntyinen, lähinnä Englannissa työskennellyt tuottaja-ohjaaja Caspar Wrede kävi käsiksi Solzhenitsyn romaanin elokuvasovitukseen ennen Nobel-palkinnon myöntämistä ja elokuva valmistui parahiksi kohun vanaveteen. "Kiehtovinta ja voimakkainta tässä kirjassa on se", Wrede kertoi ensi-illan aikoihin, "että se kuvaa tavallista päivää tavallisen keskitysleirivangin elämässä Stalinin aikana, mutta samalla se on jotakin aivan muuta. Solzhenitsyn kuvaa olosuhteisiin nähden miellyttävä, hyvän ja menestyksellisen päivän. Merkillinen riemu, joka kirjasta henkii vastaan, tuntuu osoittavan, että kirjailija on saanut meille pelkistetyksi kokemuksen, joka yksinkertaisimmillaan on pelkkää itsesäilytystä, mutta joka osoittaa, että inhimillistä henkeä ei voi lannistaa."

Wreden elokuva on arvokas kunnianteko arvokkaalle ja arvostettavalle kirjailijalle. Alkuteoksesta olisi helposti saanut sellaisen karkean antikommunistisen elokuvan, jollaisena suomalaiset tarkastuselimet ovat siihen kaikissa portaissa suhtautuneet, mutta Wreden lähestymistapa on toinen. Ajan ja paikan määritykset Wrede kuittaa lyhyesti, miltei kuivasti – Stalinin kehystetty kuva komentoparakin seinällä – eikä hän muutenkaan korostele ja paisuttele, vaan pyrkii vilpittömin mielin tulkitsemaan Solzhenitsyn sanomaa. Ajallinen välimatka alkuteokseen korostaa syvempiä tarkoituksia: madonluvut stalinismille ovat pintakerros, jonka alla tarkastellaan monin elävin ja rikkain variaatioin ihmisyyden tilaa olosuhteissa, joissa olemassaolon edellytykset ovat kutistuneet äärimmilleen: Nämä kutistetun elintilan ja totaalisen vapaudenriiston näyttämöt eivät rajoitu Stalinin ajan vankileireille, joita Solzhenitsyn oman kokemuspiirinsä ja näkemyksensä mukaan kuvaa eräänlaisen avaran kristillisen humanismin hengessä. Wreden elokuva on ulkoisesti sangen "uskollinen" kirjalle tavoittaen myös sen hengen koruttomasti ja vakuuttavasti.

– Sakari Toiviainen 9.12.1993 eri lähteiden mukaan

ANTONIONI AND HITCHCOCK

I vinti - Strangers on a Train
Il grido - Vertigo
L'avventura - Psycho
Il deserto rosso - Marnie
Blow-Up - Rear Window
Zabriskie Point - North by Northwest
Profession: Reporter - The Man Who Knew Too Much

L'avventura / The Adventure (the integral restored version distributed by Mediaset / Compass Film in 2008)

Michelangelo Antonioni: L'avventura / The Adventure (IT/FR 1960). Monica Vitti as Claudia. Photo from: Gary Tooze / DVD Beaver, 2014.

Seikkailu / Äventyret.

    IT/FR 1960. D: Michelangelo Antonioni. 141 min

    The restored version by Mediaset / Compass Film etc. 

    A Cinecittà Holding print with English subtitles viewed at Cinema Orion, 7 September 2008

Trilogia esistenziale.

Trilogia dell'incomunicabilità.

In memoriam Michelangelo Antonioni 1912-2007.

Michelangelo Antonioni and Ingmar Bergman died on the same day, 30 July 2007, a year ago.

The definitive version, but print has a slightly duped look (not quite sharp). The visual quality in our vintage print is superior. But in Finland L'avventura was released in a shortened version of 130 min.

I watched the first reel of the masterpiece only. In Rome, Anna (Lea Massari) says goodbye to his father. He has retired from his job as a diplomat (decades of lies), and is now retiring from his position as a father. 

In vain he warns Anna from Sandro (Gabriele Ferzetti, famous from having portrayed Casanova and Puccini). He has seen through him. 

Anna and Claudia (Monica Vitti) drive to Sandro, at whose home Anna seduces him to make love. They start the sea journey on a yacht to the Aeolian islands of Sicily. 

The sense of freedom and alienation is unique from the outset. 

In Antonioni's obituaries (the best of which was written by Martin Scorsese in The New York Times) this film's status as a turning-point in film history was confirmed. It taught us a new way to see.

...

It looks like the restorers of this edition did not have access to the camera negative. Might the negative have been stuck at this point in the Leo Kirch limbo.

Jour de fête

Lystikäs kirjeenkantaja / Den roliga brevbäraren / Holiday. FR 1949. D+starring Jacques Tati. The digitally restored (1995) Thomsoncolor version, 79 min. With e-subtitles in Finnish by Lena Talvio. Viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 7 September 2008. - I watched the last reel only of Tati's masterpiece to check out the restoration of the experimental Thomsoncolor. It was pleasant but felt slightly too much duped, the film has the same look as hand-painted silents a hundred years ago, the colour scale is a bit like watercolour, not perfectly matching the outlines, and it even resembles computer-coloured videos. I remember having seen also colour footage from this film with a more pointillistic approach. I prefer the black & white version, but both are great.

Erottamattomat / Sisters Apart

Hanna Maylett: Erottamattomat / Sisters Apart (FI 2008) with Tiina Lymi (Taru) and Minna Haapkylä (Eve).

De oskiljaktiga / [literal translation of the title: The Inseparable].
    FI © 2008 Kinotar. P: Lasse Saarinen, Risto Salomaa.
    D: Hanna Maylett. SC: Tarja Kylmä. DP: Jyri Hakala – HDTV – shot on Sony CineAlta F23 – digital intermediate Generator Post, Digital Film Finland – distributed in 35mm 1:2,35. M: Sanna Salmenkallio.
    Starring Minna Haapkylä (Eve), Tiina Lymi (Taru), Kaneli Johansson (Ninni), Jorma Tommila (Harri).
    Loc: Tyrnävä.
    101 min.
    Released by Nordisk with Swedish subtitles by Saliven Gustavson.
    Viewed at Maxim 1, Helsinki, 6 September 2008.

A gray digital intermediate look.

On a horse farm in the province of Pohjanmaa (Ostrobothnia), Finland, the teenage daughter Ninni is kicked by the maverick Indigo and taken to hospital by her stepmother Taru and her father Harri. Her biological mother Eve, who lives in Sweden, is alerted, and she comes back the next day having abandoned her baby ten years ago.

The single kick of a horse causes turbulence in all of their lives.

Strengths include performances by Minna Haapkylä and Tiina Lymi. The visual concept of the film is effective, juxtaposing the stagnation in the protagonists' lives with the life force of the horses and the presence of a big river and its rapids. The film would be even better if the concept were more dynamic in storytelling or otherwise. Boldly the film has been shot in the gray rain of October. Much of the force of the crane shots and other well-composed images is lost in digital transition.

Con Michelangelo

IT 2005. D: Enrica Antonioni. 58 min. Dvd from Cinecittà Holding viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 6 September 2008. - Painting with the assistance of a young woman. - Driving to Cannes, meeting Thierry Frémaux. Since his paralysis in a stroke in 1985 Antonioni was unable to speak. - Looks beautiful for a dvd. - I saw the first 20 min only.

Antonioni, lo sguardo che cambiò il cinema

Antonioni: The Eye That Changed Cinema. IT 2001. D: Carlo di Carlo, Sandro Lai. 60 min. A Betacam from Cinecittà Holding with English subtitles by Charlotte Lantery viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 6 September 2008. - A comprehensive and exciting compilation of Antonioni's statements about his art, from his early shorts till Al di là delle nuvole. - L'avventura outtake (the cobbler game). - Antonioni & Monica Vitti screening rushes. - The question of colour: the blatant manipulation in Il deserto rosso and Blow-Up. "I changed London to become more London". - "Each film is a battle". - Blow-Up: "other films I did with my stomach, this one with my head". - Zabriskie Point difficult to film because of the US working methods, difficult to improvise. - Chung Kuo Cina: the concept of community, belonging. The trouble afterwards was related to the status of Chou En Lai. - Professione: reporter: the first film not based on my own script. More discreet narrative. - Il mistero di Oberwald: tv cameras, electronics, changing colour at will. - Identificazione di una donna: "not characters in crisis but characters who reveal crises." - 1983: "screens are getting smaller, tv sets bigger." - Quantum physics: "nothing is certain." - Communicating incommunication. - Silence. - Against shot / counter-shot. "People misunderstand each other even face to face." - "For Wenders, film-making is crazy fun, for me, almost suffering." - "The woman is a subtler filter of reality, with more ties to mystery." - "The moral purpose in life can also be called God." - Antonioni exhibition with artwork based on Il deserto rosso. - The companionship of Enrica Antonioni. Filming Al di là delle nuvole, Enrica: "Wim is an angel". The tender look at Enrica. "The most courageous." Final image: Jack Nicholson extends him the Oscar in 1995.

WALL*E

WALL-E / WALL-E. US (c) 2008 Disney / Pixar. EX: John Lasseter. D: Andrew Stanton. SC: Stanton, Jim Reardon - based on a story by Stanton, Pete Docter. M: Thomas Newman. "La Vie en rose" perf. Louis Armstrong. Supervising AN: Alan Barillaro, Steven Clay Hunter. Directing AN: Angus MacLane. Original format: Digital - distributed as D-Cinema and 35mm film prints in 1:2,35. Voice talent: Ben Burtt (WALL-E / M-O), Elissa Knight (EVE), Jeff Garlin (Captain), Fred Willard (Shelby Fortright - BnL CEO), MacIn Talk (AUTO), John Ratzenberger (John), Kathy Najimy (Mary), Sigourney Weaver (Ship's Computer). 98 min. Released in Finland by Buena Vista International Finland. Original English version with Finnish / Swedish subtitles by Marko Hartama / Janne Staffans viewed in 35mm at Tennispalatsi 5, Helsinki, 6 September 2008. - A masterpiece. - Digital animation at its best, a satire of the mechanical world and pollution. A vision of the brave new world in the Huxley tradition. The earth has become unfit to live. Mankind has escaped on a mothership to outer space, and in 700 years everybody has become a paunchy couch potato, practically invalid, subsisting on fast food and the ubiquitous entertainment monitor. - The main relationship is between two robots, vaguely similar with Lady and the Tramp. - Fine scenes: the space dance, the revolt of the computers. - The scifi tributes are not overdone, end credit art is a beautiful exercise in pastiche. - Thomas Newman's whimsical music has affinities with Henry Mancini (Hatari!). - The computer definition of "Earth" includes a glimpse of D.W. Griffith's A Corner in Wheat.

Presto

Doug Sweetland (US 2008).

US © 2008 Disney / Pixar. Animation. D: Doug Sweetland. 5 min. – Released in Finland by Buena Vista International Finland. 35 mm at Tennispalatsi 5, Helsinki, 6 September 2008. – The rabbit sabotages the magician's act as he refuses to feed it with a carrot.

Hitler's Children

Hitlerin lapset. US (c) 1943 RKO. P: Edward A. Golden. D: Edward Dmytryk. SC: Emmet Lavery - based on the book Education for Death (1941) by Gregor Ziemer. DP: Russell Metty. M: Roy Webb. Starring Tim Holt (Ltn. Karl Bruner), Bonita Granville (Anna Miller), Kent Smith (Prof. Nichols), Otto Kruger (Col. Henkel), H.B. Warner (the Bishop), Lloyd Corrigan (Franz Erhart), Erford Gage (Dr. Schmidt), Hans Conried (Dr. Graf), Peter Van Eyck (arresting sergeant). 82 min. A 16mm C&C television print viewed at Bio Asta, Filmens Hus, Copenhagen, 5 September 2008. - Dmytryk already had a long career when he started to attract attention directing films like this. It is a straightforward political drama about Nazi Germany in 1933-1939, with an interesting montage in the beginning. The fictional story bringing to life the story of the rise of Hitler's Germany. The main characters are the schoolchildren Karl and Anna who grow into young adults, Karl into a Gestapo soldier, Anna into a young woman believing in the American ideal of liberty (she is an American citizen). - The drama is harsh and abrupt, but not far removed from reality? - The Nazis are not caricatures, which makes convincing the greatest horror that Anna could become a Nazi, too. - A memorable character is journalist Franz Erhard, who has to be afraid of his own children. He never gives up silent resistance. - A major theme: compulsive sterilization for those who cannot support strong Germany, including women with incorrect political thought. - A turning-point at the church where the bishop is proud to denounce the Führer. "Let me die while I'm still proud I'm a German". "A special prayer for our speedy destruction at the hands of our enemies". - As Anna is about to be whipped and sterilized, Karl rescues her, but submits to a radio trial, where he is expected to give an example for all. He utilizes the opportunity to praise Goethe's lesson of life against an education for death. "To live is to be free. Long live the enemies of Nazi Germany". All Germany hears Gestapo shoot Karl and Anna live on the air. - The film is based on the personal experience of Gregor Ziemer, an American educator in Germany in the 1930s. The book was also the source for the Disney propaganda short Education for Death (also 1943).

Films at the Nordic meeting

Viewed at the Nordic meeting, Bio Carl, Filmens Hus, Copenhagen, 5 September 2008.
Med Ingrid Bergman på Berns (SE 1953) 6 min. A sample.
Et luftangrepp paa Padua (IT 1917) 6 min. Billeder af nedskudte fly udenfor byen Padova. Billeder af ödelagte huse. Desuden billeder fra Bassano og Castelfranco. A sample.
Carmen, Jr. / Baby Peggy som Tyrefägter (US 1925), D: Alfred J. Goulding, 11 min. A sample

Chapellerie et charcuterie automatiques

FR 1908. P: Gaumont. D: Alice Guy. Print preserved at Svenska Filminstitutet. Short film projected from the dvd Gaumont Box: Le Cinéma premier Vol 1 (1897-1913) Guy - Feuillade - Perret. Viewed at the Nordic meeting, Bio Carl, Filmens Hus, Copenhagen, 5 September 2008. - A fantasy comedy of the marvellous machine that produces hats and sausages.

La Fée aux choux / The Cabbage Patch Fairy

Alice Guy: La Fée aux choux / The Cabbage Patch Fairy. Three versions: 1896 (58 mm without perforations, lost), 1900 (35 mm, aka Une fée dépose des bébés vivants qu'elle retire des choux) and 1902 (35 mm, aka Sage-femme de première classe).

FR 1900. P: Gaumont. D: Alice Guy. Conte fantastique. This version (Une fée dépose des bébés vivants qu'elle retire des choux) was identified in 1996 at Svenska Filminstitutet. Short film projected from the dvd Gaumont Box: Le Cinéma premier Vol 1 (1897-1913) Guy - Feuillade - Perret. Viewed at the Nordic meeting, Bio Carl, Filmens Hus, Copenhagen, 5 September 2008. - Charming fantasmagoria: children are born from cabbages.

Sydpoleekspedisjonen 1910-1912

[The South Pole Expedition 1910-1912]. Shot by Roald Amundsen and his crew. Restored by Nasjionalbiblioteket (Norge) (2008). Based on the original negative and the English print with English subtitles. Presented by Morten Skallerud at the meeting of the Nordic film archives, Bio Carl, Copenhagen, 4 September 2008. 21 min. - First screened as HDSR projection, and then as a film projection. - The Norwegian Roald Amundsen (1872-1928) led the first Antarctic expedition to reach the South Pole in 1910-1912. Incredibly, there was also a film record, shot by Amundsen and his colleagues. - A good definition. - The ship being fitted up for the expedition. The provisions, the dogs (Greenland huskies and a Samoyed lead bitch). Entertainment aboard, a man in woman's clothes. A lively atmosphere. - The chef is the Henrik Lindström well-known in the Nordic countries for his "Lindström's steak". - The Bay of Whales: shoals of whales. - Dwellings. Antarctic midsummer. Minus 60 grades Centigrade. - Not filmed: sledges hauled by dogs take the men to the South Pole. - Funny shot of man meeting penguin, in a silhouette-like composition. - (Not in the film: killing seals, penguins and many of the dogs for food.) - Since the 1980s a short English version has been available but maybe not very well-known. Now the original material has been restored and reconstructed properly. - Also Shackleton shot South Pole footage before and after Amundsen. Scott filmed South Pole footage simultaneously with Amundsen. Penguins were a favourite motif with all. - The HDSR projection looked good, the 35mm film print even better.

Reinventing Ourselves in Programming (at The Nordic Film Archives' Meeting in Copenhagen)

Rainer Werner Fassbinder: Berlin Alexanderplatz 1–13 + epilogue (DE 1980), 14 h 30 min. Screening extremely short and extremely long films belongs to the honourable tasks of film archive programmers.

The world of the moving images changes so fast that we, the programmers of film archives, need to reconsider our vision annually and even more frequently. Home cinemas with large screens, internet downloading, dvd, high-definition dvd such as Bluray, digital television and high definition television – they all change the landscape rapidly.

    Besides, during the recent decades the film festival proliferation and their growing popularity, art museum and gallery presentations of moving images, and huge high profile live cinema and other events have brought new and exciting forums for quality films and classics of the cinema for wider audiences.

    As many of us have stated, we are no longer as unique as we used to be during the decades from the 1940s to the 1970s. I think all this is great. And of course, we the archives are participating in much of these new phenomena.

    Yet, although an extraordinary selection of films is available on tv, dvd, and the net, if we look at our programmes, most of the titles there are still difficult or impossible to find for home viewing. That, however, is likely to change.

    But regarding home viewing we know that nothing can replace the cinema experience. A big film's feeling for space and landscape can only be experienced in the cinema. An intimate psychological film, a chamber piece such as Ingmar Bergman's, is at its most intensive in the cinema. A comedy is many times funnier when experienced by a cinema audience with its successive waves of laughter. A thriller or a horror film is much more effective in the darkness of the cinema.

    Although festivals, art cinemas, galleries such as Centre Pompidou and special events offer many of the things that cinematheques have traditionally presented, and sometimes better than we do, the combination of a film archive's programming is unique.

    Each of us has a distinctive profile of programming, but we have many things in common. The following is an attempt to summarize the Finnish recipe of programming in 16 points. The Finnish programming aims at "full service" of everything that a cinematheque is expected to offer. The vision has always been to present "all cinema" in a meaningful way. During our 50 years of activity we have gained a special role in the country's cultural life, close links with other arts and a nationwide presence from Helsinki to Lapland. We have achieved a brand of quality. This, however, can never be taken for granted. Each season, the brand has to be earned over again. The only constant is change.

    1. META-PROGRAMMING. Meta-programming means that there are continuities and balances that stretch over years and even decades. Some films have "heavy rotation" to borrow MTV terminology, other themes unfold slowly. There are attempts to balance films of various periods and countries, without mechanical constraints. Sometimes there are practical reasons to programme too many films of the same era, of a similar sensibility or cultural background. Then adjustments need to be made to restore the balance in the next future.

    2. FILM HISTORY. The most important keynote principle is to present the great outlines of film history - the main periods of style, the historical turning-points, the key works. A rule of thumb is that a young person who comes to Helsinki for five years to study can get a good general education of film history by following the screenings of Cinema Orion. More profoundly, history can be examined through cinema, and even fiction films seen as documents of history. Most excitingly, we can trace a philosophy of history through the cinema.

    3. THE WORLD CINEMA. Another keynote principle is world cinema. The general cinema distribution is dominated by Hollywood entertainment. It is our pleasant vocation to pay tribute to the rest of the world. Even European cinema is under-represented in the current commercial Finnish cinema repertory. Asian and Latin American cinemas deserve attention. Satu Laaksonen's series of Arab, Iranian and African films have been especially ambitious, and they have left lasting marks. The archive has always played an essential role in opening up Japanese cinema to Finnish audiences.

    4. NATIONAL CINEMA. Cinema Orion is the home of Finnish film art in its whole spectrum. Central artists such as Jarva, Kurkvaara, Tapiovaara, and the Kaurismäkis get special treatment. Complete retrospective are mounted of even the most prolific directors such as Vaala, Laine, Leminen, Kassila, Unho and Hällström. Restored films are brought to the screen sometimes after generations (Tulio). Finnish cinema in extenso is the largest retrospective, and in a small country like Finland it is possible to screen all: of the 1250 Finnish feature films produced in a hundred years 690 have been screened in Cinema Orion. Together with the Risto Jarva Society dozens of film artists have been celebrated as special guests in extensive tributes to Finnish cinema.

    5. THE CLASSICS. The concept of the classic (even if elusive, shifting, changing, controversial) is at the core of cinematheque programmin. The top ten films of Britain's Sight & Sound (last polled in 2002) are also examples of the best-loved films in Cinema Orion: Citizen Kane, Vertigo, The Rules of the Game, The Godfather, Tokyo Story, 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Battleship Potyomkin, Sunrise, 8½, and Singin' in the Rain.

    6. THE BIG RETROSPECTIVES. The big or complete retrospectives of the masters are trump cards of the film archive. They take a lot of space, but every generation deserves a full retrospective of Mizoguchi, Renoir, Hitchcock, Bergman... In between it makes sense to mount selective retrospectives. It is equally important to present the lesser-known directors in a proper balance. The anti-Hollywood bias of the archive audiences sometimes plays tricks with the attendance to retrospectives of American directors, including even John Ford, whose work we would like to screen more than the audience is ready to receive.

    7. AVANTGARDE. Cinematheques have always been a cradle of experimental films (avantgarde, artists' films). They are treated with tender love, because in experimental films cinema is born again. The experimental film collections and series of The Museum of Modern Art and the Goethe-Institut have received a lot of space in Cinema Orion, and together with Mika Taanila, himself a film artist, and the Avanto Festival, ambitious events have been arranged, as the quasi-complete retrospective of Finnish experimental film accompanied by the book Sähkömetsä (The Electric Forest), and a large and successful tribute to P. Adams Sitney and Jonas Mekas' New American Cinema tours in 1968.

    8. DOCUMENTARY. Another constant is the emphasis on the documentary film. Besides feature-length documentaries, for the last 25 years, there has been an inspired series called Treasures from the Archives edited for the Tampere Short Film Festival by Raimo Silius and Lauri Tykkyläinen. And in this decade there have been over 40 special programs called In the Core of the Documentary, curated by Ilkka Kippola and Jari Sedergren, with a radical agenda of rewriting film history, and maybe even rewriting history.

    9. ANIMATION. A further major strand is animation, from Japanese anime, Russian fairy-tales and Czech classics to the surrealism of the Quay Brothers. The great Americans such as Walt Disney, Tex Avery, and Warner Bros. have been screened really extensively in Cinema Orion, but animation mega-series seem to wear out most spectators. The main dilemma is that the films are meant to be screened singly, but in a retrospective they need to be packaged together. The most popular animation figure in Cinema Orion is Krtek (The Little Mole): his shows sell out. Finnish animation (Katariina Lillqvist and others) is presented with special care.

    10. COUNTER-HISTORY. There has been a revival of the secret histories of the cinema thanks to the Tarantino phenomenon. Blaxploitation, Hong Kong martial arts movies, Italowesterns, Hammer horror and Japanese monster films had been screened in Cinema Orion before Tarantino, but thanks to him, there has been a new level of ambition comparable to the Venice Film Festival's "secret history of the Italian cinema" projects. Two guest curators, Lauri Lehtinen and Antti Suonio, have mounted special retrospectives in Cinema Orion with such inspiration that they themselves have received brand recognition. Formerly popular concepts such as "cult movies" and "B movies" are fading as being too broad and misleading in this new generation of discovery.

    11. RESTORATION. Rescuing films from oblivion, saving them from destruction, and actually preserving and restoring them, is the core concept of the archives, and screening restored treasures is our happiest mission. The 70th anniversary tribute to La Cinémathèque française and the Centenary retrospective of the Nordisk company in brilliant prints from Det Danske Filminstitut have been some of those happy occasions, as well as recent retrospectives of Sjöström and Stiller from Svenska Filminstitutet or the new Lubitsch prints from the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung.

    12. EARLY CINEMA. Particular attention is paid to early cinema, the films before the First World War, the age of the pioneers before the breakthrough of the feature film. We have acquired our own sets of prints of Helsinki's first Lumière show, of Edwin S. Porter and the Edison Manufacturing Co., and of the Skladanowsky films. Our foreign film archivist, Juha Kindberg, has preserved, restored and researched in depth our own early film treasures, also for the Orion screenings. Among the discoveries: an exciting Pathé compilation of the Russian revolution of 1905, including the original Pathé version of the Battleship Potyomkin.

    13. THE FORBIDDEN, THE DIFFICULT, THE IMPOSSIBLE. Some films have been impossible to see anywhere but in the archive. In 2001, film censorship was abolished in Finland, but during decades many classics were banned by the Finnish counterpart of the Production Code Administration (Trouble in Paradise, The Blue Angel... ) and later by the state board of classification (the ban of One, Two, Three in Finland until 1986 was itself a Wilderian joke). The archive was the place to see Salò and The Empire of the Senses, then banned, now free. Since the glasnost the discoveries of banned films from Russia and East Europe have been abundant, including the Locarno discoveries of the Unknown Soviet Cinema. It is also the task of the archive to screen films that are extremely short (early cinema, Fluxus) or extremely long. Cinema Orion is the place to see in full Scenes from a Marriage (Bergman), Berlin Alexanderplatz (Fassbinder), Hitler (Syberberg), Shoah (Lanzmann), Pagnol's Marseille trilogy in one long night, or the Finnish masterpiece The Eight Deadly Shots (Niskanen) in its only correct version of over five hours.

    14. RARE FORMATS. For a long time film archives were the only venues where one could see silent films properly projected. It is a pleasant sign of the times that awareness of the correct presentation of silent and classic films is spreading. All aspect ratios, projection speeds, sound formats including magnetic sound, sepmag 16mm, and so on are respected in Cinema Orion, which also belongs to the archival cinemas that still screen nitrate. It has been a privilege to see first generation nitrate prints of Finnish classics in the Vaala, Leminen, and Unho retrospectives. Also screenings of nitrate copies of Murnau, Sternberg, Ophuls, Flaherty and Ford have given the Orion spectators a special awareness of their art. The definition of light was often personally supervised by the director. Current generations can still see the result first-hand.

    15.  PUTTING INTO PERSPECTIVE. Film programming is not stamp collecting. It is revisiting films, rediscovering films both in the large context of history and culture and as single electric jolts. Special theme series give accents and create new connections. Programme booklets give introductions to the current themes, program notes give detailed facts and interpretations of the single films, sometimes at a high ambition level. Artists themselves and experts, scholars and archivists as special guests, lecture series, seminars, and live cinema events, all deepen the experiences and make them unique. Cinema is the privileged art of "time regained" in the Proustian-Benjaminian sense. Screenings can change the way we see history, our parents' and grandparents' lives, ourselves.

    16. ACCESS AS WIDE AS POSSIBLE. Film archives are not film distributors, but in Finland, access is as generous as possible within FIAF standards and the rights-holders' consent. Besides the archive's own programming in ten university cities from Helsinki to Lapland (in Helsinki, Joensuu,
Jyväskylä, Lahti, Oulu, Rovaniemi, Tampere, Turku, Vaasa) we are partners for film festivals and special events of nation-wide relevance, let film students access archival prints, organize national tours of new prints of classic film and participate actively in the global exchange of programming. Film clubs have always been our best friends, and although we don't circulate archival prints in film clubs, our common interest is to get more new prints of classic films into general distribution.

     The question of attendance has become topical in the last couple of years. Our attendance in Cinema Orion, which seats 216, had a steady average of some 60 viewers per screening, until in the autumn in 2006 there was a drop to some 50 per screening. This can still be a matter of a natural ebb and flow. In the Finnish archive's other cities the performance has been strong, and film festivals (many of them with archival features) are at the peak of their popularity. But this is a challenge, and it has to be taken seriously. There are many fronts to consider. The single most important is the home front: the new home viewing with the magnificent home cinemas and the seemingly limitless access to films from the net, dvd, and tv. It has come to stay and will get much stronger. Yet people will notice the superiority of the cinema experience. Our core audiences tend to live in cramped circumstances, and they want to enjoy the space of the cinema.

    One of the challenges is the audience specialization. In 2002 we mounted an anime series of the best-known standard titles with great success, although the prints available were dubbed in English. In 2007 we mounted a much more ambitious anime retrospective in original-language prints with English subtitles. It was not so successful, and apparently the reason for that was that the anime fans have meanwhile specialized into several subgroups that are more difficult to reach.

    Facing new challenges, we need to reinvent ourselves. In Finland we are expanding our film education activity, working with schools and children. Our close cooperation with the universities' student film activists has been wakened after a certain period of passivity.

    Quality becomes more important: quality of films, prints, and presentation. Paradoxically, tolerance of films that are not translated into the national language is weakening, perhaps because of the growing availability of subtitled films for home viewing. We now feel the need to offer a Finnish translation of films in Swedish or with Swedish subtitles only, although Swedish is the second official language of bilingual Finland. Eventually all films ought to have Finnish in them, and there is likely to be a big jump ahead in electronic subtitling with D-Cinema.

    There is the disquieting situation of film criticism (and of film culture, and even of any appreciation of "difficult" culture). Globally the space of serious film writing is diminishing in the main media. In Finland we were hit hard a few years ago. There were seven film journalists that had an active interest in the film archive in the main newspaper Helsingin Sanomat. Now there are only two. Our atmosphere in the traditional media has shrunk.

    Cinephilia is a key question. In Helsinki we still have a core group of cinephiles that have attended our screenings since day one for over 50 years. They include the founders of the archive, Jörn Donner and Aito Mäkinen. New generations have joined them, and pleasantly enough, there are several young cinephiles.

    We are searching for the best way to establish a stronger internet presence. The archive's homepage has already been a major channel for years, but we want to build on this. We are launching ourself in Facebook. We are looking seriously into online ticket sales, which at first seems overwhelming for a small organization, but we need to go there.

    As colleagues have stated, we are living in an event culture. We need to face this and create events ourselves, realizing that this is a time of increasingly specialized audiences that can time and again cross over.

Back to Bataan

Viidakon partisaanit / Djungelpartisaner / Urskovens partisaner. US 1945. PC: RKO. EX: Robert Fellows. D: Edward Dmytryk. SC: Ben Barzman, Richard H. Landau - from a story by Aeneas MacKenzie, William Gordon. DP: Nicholas Musuraca. M: Roy Webb. Starring John Wayne (Col. Joseph Madden), Anthony Quinn (Capt. Andrés Bonifácio), Beulah Bondi (Bertha Barnes), Fely Franquelli (Dolici Dalgado), Lawrence Tierney (Lt. Cmdr. Waite). 95 min. A DFI print with danske tekster viewed at Bio Carl, Filmens Hus, Copenhagen, 4 September 2008. - The story of the Philippines during WWII told as Hollywood entertainment. Japan conquers the Philippines from the US and grants them fake independence. The US manage to win even former anti-US Filipino freedom fighters to their side (the Bonifácio story). - An interesting feature is that the influential Filipino female speaker on the Japanese radio, Dolici Dalgado, is actually a counter-spy for the US. - John Wayne is very good in his role of the guerrilla leader. - It starts with desperate losses, and guerrilla warfare is punished with excessive retribution by the Japanese. - Wayne portrays convincingly the control needed in heated moments, when he is provoked, and especially when the arguments against him are valid: the terrible moral choice of carrying out guerrilla strikes while innocent civilians get sacrificed. Wayne can project leadership based on innate authority and dignity. - Beulah Bondi is also very good as the schoolteacher turned guerrilla. - There are fine action scenes, as the one where Andrés Bonifácio (Anthony Quinn) is rescued from the prisoners' terrible death march by ruse. - Maybe the finest sequence is the confession in the Catholic church, where Bonifacio disguised as a priest meets Dolici and first then realizes that she is on their side and not the Japanese propagandist everyone thinks she is. Also Fely Franquelli gives a fine performance.

Chung Kuo - Cina parte 1

Chung Kuo - Kiina osa 1 / Antonionis Kina 1 / China 1. IT (c) 1972 RAI. D: Michelangelo Antonioni. SC: Antonioni, Andrea Barbato. DP: Luciano Tovoli - original format? - colour - print 35mm. TV documentary. The whole film 207 min, the first part 76 min. A 35mm Cinecittà print with English subtitles viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 2 September 2008. - A good 35mm print, with full colour, as good as it gets, of a film that was apparently shot on 16mm. - Antonioni's fascinating tv documentary was made when China was barely emerging from the purgatory / hell of the Cultural Revolution, and Antonioni was one of the early witnesses of China's opening. - The documentary is honestly presented as one strictly controlled by the authorities. - It starts on the Tiananmen Square, the children's song "I Love Tiananmen Square", the center of the world, Chung Kuo meaning "the central country". - Antonioni traces faces, gestures, habits. We are conscious of the bans and restrictions imposed on him. - Tai chi. - Caesarean section with acupuncture anaesthesia. - The society of a huge textile factory, with kindergartens, simple homes, work is not hectic. - Art and culture to the masses. - The Great Wall. - The Holy Road of the Spirits. - The Museum of the Revolution. - The life in the land is constant struggle. Visiting farms and markets. - Back in Peking, in the Forbidden City, which has recently been opened. Interminable waiting of the imperial era brings to mind Kafka. - An old woman whose feet were deformed in the old era. - The new Peking, new urbanization. - Tien Tan: the Temple of the Heaven. - Cheng An: the puppet theatre with many puppet musicians.

Antonionin lyhytelokuvia 2

Kortfilmer av Antonioni 2 / Antonioni Shorts 2. IT 1978-1997. Tapes and prints from Cinecittà Holding. Viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 31 August 2008.
Ritorna a Lisca Bianca. IT 1983. PC: RAI Tre. D: Michelangelo Antonioni. DP: Carlo Di Palma. 8 min. Betacam, alas. - Revisiting the location of L'avventura.
Gianni Moretti: Fotoromanza. IT 1984. P: Maurizio La Pira. D+SC: Michelangelo Antonioni. DP: Luciano Tovoli (video). 6 min. Betacam. - A music video to Gianni Moretti's pop song "Fotoromanza", a typical music video of its era. The artist in the room watching a monitor. Numbers flying from the telephone. Smoke emerging from behind the door. Slow motion. Solarization. Manhattan skyline and gangster cliches. Boxing motifs. Clumsy superimpositions. The music video now looks like a parody of the early MTV era, and the audience could not help but laugh.
Kumbha Mela. IT 1989. P: Enrica Antonioni. D: Michelangelo Antonioni. DP: Carlo Di Palma. 18 min. Betacam, alas. - A devout vision of the Hindi purification rites in the holy water of the river Ganges, beautifully shot, with haunting Indian music.
Roma '90. IT 1990. PC: Recta Film / Istituto Luce et Ministerio del Turismo e dello Spettacolo. D: Michelangelo Antonioni. DP: Fiorenza Muller. M: baroque classics such as Vivaldi. 10'. - A wonderful view of the beauty of the buildings, statues and paintings of Rome, focusing finally on the Cappella Sistina, Michelangelo meeting Michelangelo, final image: God's hand gives spirit to Man. In gorgeous colour in analogue 35mm.
Noto, Mandorli, Vulcano, Stromboli, Carnevale. IT 1992. D: Michelangelo Antonioni. DP: Felice de Maria. 11 min. A cluster of five short films from the Sicilian area and the Tyrrhenian Sea. Visions of volcanic power and a Sicilian carneval. Splendidly beautiful in a brilliant 35mm print.
Sicilia. IT 1997. PC: Arancia Cinema. D: Michelangelo Antonioni. DP: Maurizio Dell'Orco. 12 min. Volcano, ruins, clouds, fountain, market, woman on the beach. Delicious views in a gorgeous 35mm print.
Antonioni vista da Antonioni. IT 1978. PC: Unità Procuttiva CCS. D+interviewer: Lino Miccichè. DP: Luciano Tovoli. Interviewee: Michelangelo Antonioni. 26 min. Betacam, very bad visual quality with horizontal lines, sound unnatural. - Antonioni in good form in this interview that starts from Gente del Po. His early interest in the private and the social. The Italian episode of I vinti destroyed by censorship (Neofascism as a subject not allowed). The theme of the falsification of images. I have always had to fight to make my films, some have been huge commercial flops. When I started, melodramas such as Catene were popular. I made unfeeling melodramas. The market tried to isolate Antonioni. Le amiche: the outlook on life very different from Pavese. I focus on female characters because women are a more subtle filter of reality. The psychological stress in the working class because of the lack of money.

Happy-Go-Lucky

Happy-Go-Lucky / Happy-Go-Lucky. GB (c) 2007 [Southwark Untitled?] / Ingenious Film Partners / Summit Entertainment / Thin Man Films / UK Film Council. P: Simon Channing-Williams. D+SC: Mike Leigh. DP: Dick Pope - digital intermediate - 35 mm film print 1:2,35. M: Gary Yershon. Starring Sally Hawkins (Poppy), Alexis Zegerman (Zoe), Andrea Riseborough (Dawn), Samuel Roukin (Tim), Sinead Matthews (Alice), Kate O'Flynn (Suzy), Sarah Niles (Tash), Eddie Marsan (Scott). 118 min. Finnish release by Sandrew with Finnish / Swedish subtitles by Taina Komu / Joanna Erkkilä. Viewed at Maxim 2, Helsinki, 30 August 2008. - A pleasant film look with warm and bright colour. - My favourite Mike Leigh movie. - An original comedy with the concept of jolly Poppy meeting a variety of often surly characters. - Can be compared with Amélie, but this movie is fresher. - The 30-something Poppy is the life of the party wherever she goes. She is a teacher of the junior level, who visits a bookstore, enjoys a girls' party, loses her bicycle, starts driving lessons, and practices the flamenco. Helping a disturbed kid who is a school bully she meets a child psychologist, and they date. Meanwhile, her driving instructor loses his mental balance. - A pleasant Gary Yershon score.