The programme includes a selection of new film gems from familiar masters as well as fresh new names. Croatian Veljko Vidak’s documentary Cinéma Laika has its world premiere at the festival. The festival also presents the best of the Finnish cinema of the past season.
The Midnight Sun Film Festival will hold the world premiere of the documentary Cinéma Laika, which dives into life at the cinema Kino Laika, founded by Aki Kaurismäki and Mika Lätti. Croatian filmmaker Veljko Vidak recently spent more than a year in Karkkila, documenting step by step how a new cultural oasis grew up on the local factory estate and quickly gained great popularity and a cult reputation. The documentary grows into a poetic tableau of an entire warm-hearted community, an authentic Kaurismäki fairy tale land and artists’ (of life) collective. In addition to the maestro himself, we get to hear friends and villagers, collaborators of many decades, and younger colleagues.
The programme will once again offer a selection of the best in today’s new films under the title Gems of New Cinema. Jean-Pierre ja Luc Dardenne captured Sodankylä in 2005 with their sympathetic natures, and their newest Tori and Lokita is an ascetic film about immigration, children and youth – as experienced at the grass-roots level of the streets. Sodankylä guest of 2000 Paolo Taviani has made his first solo film at over 90 years old, after the death of his brother Vittorio. Dedicated to his late brother, Leonora addio binds together the twisty true story of author Luigi Pirandello’s final journey and an adaptation of his farewell novella. British Terence Davies visited the festival in 2000, and his Benediction is a biographical drama of the poet Siegfried Sassoon, flowing through memories in the shadows cast by the events of the First World War.
Director Joanna Hogg, who unofficially visited the Festival in 1998, has captivated festival audiences around the world – including in Sodankylä last summer – with her autobiographical double feature The Souvenir and The Souvenir: Part II. Her latest film, the Tilda Swinton-starring The Eternal Daughter is an intriguing addition to the story of her alter ego, sprinkled with a touch of British Gothic. It’s also been a while since Icelandic Hilmar Oddsson visited the festival: the most dedicated visitors may remember when he presented his debut feature in Sodankylä 37 years ago. The director’s newer work is represented in the programme this year by the splendid dramedy Driving Mum.
The prolific French director Christophe Honoré’s Winter Boy is a touching film about a family (featuring Juliette Binoche as the mother), whose life is shaken up by a sudden loss. Honoré’s fellow countrywoman Alice Diop, who started her career making documentaries, made an assured transition into fiction with her highly acclaimed courtroom drama Saint Omer. Morroccan writer-director Maryam Touzani’s second feature The Blue Caftan is a sensual melodrama lead by three skilful actors, in which duty and desire collide amid the shady alleyways of the old medina.
Featuring Anthony Hopkins in one of the most charming performances in his career, multifaceted American James Gray’s Armageddon Time is loosely based on the director’s own childhood in Queens, New York in the 1980s. Costa Rican Valentina Maurel’s first feature I Have Electric Dreams is an authentic and poetic coming-of-age story that won a hat trick of awards at the Locarno Film Festival. Lu Zhang’s The Shadowless Tower observes modern China with nuance and insight. From Japan, we have Junji Sakamoto’s rustic and funny period film Okiku and the World, which tells the love story of a man whose job is picking up human waste and a poverty-stricken samurai’s daughter.
The Festival will also present a slate of pre-premieres of films that will later receive wider theatrical distribution. French Rebecca Zlotowski’s film Other People’s Children tells a lived-in story of a romance between grown-ups. In Georgia Oakley’s debut feature Blue Jean, a lesbian PE teacher must lead a double life in the conservative 1980s Great Britain. Estonian Anna Hints’ Sundance-awarded documentary Smoke Sauna Sisterhood leads us to a smoke sauna, in the comforting warmth of which women of different generations come together.
Festivaalin kotimaista ohjelmistoa täydentää joukko menneen esityskauden parhaita teoksia. The Festival’s Finnish programme is complemented by a selection of the best of the past season. Poet and co-screenwriter of Juho Kuosmanen’s The Happiest Day in the Life of Olli Mäki, Mikko Myllylahti made his directorial debut with The Woodcutter Story, in which arctic hysteria meets surrealism. Director-screenwriter Aino Suni’s neon-bathed jump to the world of feature-length fiction Heartbeastflaunts the confidence of a filmmaker mastering her field. Klaus Härö’s first English-language work My Sailor, My Love is a classical drama, whose strength lies in nuanced performances and careful storytelling. Anna Paavilainen’s Kikka! is a raw depiction of the dark side of the entertainment industry and the fact that no party lasts forever. Markku Pölönen humorous period film Hamsters stars Peter Franzén in his first Finnish film role in five years. The festival will also screen Pavel Andonov’s Alma Pöysti-starring melancholic short film Blue Note.
The programme also includes Finnish documentaries, like Sodankylä favourite Mika Taanila and Sami van Ingen’s Monica in the South Seas, which tells the story of Monica Flaherty’s attempt to create a soundtrack to her father Robert J. Flaherty’s classic film Moana. Veteran director Jouko Aaltonen’s How to Fix the World? recounts the short history of modern Finnish activism. The festival’s other documentary offerings include two films in the music film selection, Riitta Rask’s documentary Echoes of the Universe – The Music of Kaija Saariaho on the famous Finnish composer, and Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song (dir. Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine), which delves into the life of the musician and the story of his most famous song.
The programme also offers something to the young ones in the family. The Little Tent’s traditional film screenings will celebrate 100 years of Disney with The Love Bug (dir. Robert Stevenson) and present the first ever Pippi film Pippi Longstocking (ohj. Olle Hellbom). Animated shorts will also be screened from Baltian masters of the form, and a screening will showcase the classic characters Minttu and Vanttu, created by Maikki Harjanne who passed away in March. The selection will be capped on Sunday with a Big Tent screening of Maria Sid’s new Ricky Rapper and the Wild Machine, a colourful sequel in the family favourite series.
As always, the programme features the beloved Film Panel lead by Ville Virtanen, in which panel members will perform verbal acrobatics while describing the films they’ve seen. In Speech Karaoke Action Group’s speech karaoke, the audience gets to pick out their favourites of film history’s famous, embarassing, and confusing speeches – and perform their own take on them. In the Conversation with Finnish Filmmakers, Liselott Forsman leads a panel composed of Jussi Vatanen, Mikko Myllylahti, Juha Suonpää and Hanna Västinsalo. The discussion focuses on what drives Finnish cinema to international success, and where we are headed next in Finland.
The Midnight Sun Film Festival will be held for the 38th time in June 14-18, 2023. The schedule will be published and film cards go on sale on Monday, June 29, and individual ticket sales will start on Wednesday, May 31 at 5 pm.
We would like to thank our partners:
Trade Union Pro, EU/Creative Media, Finland Festivals, Jenny and Antti Wihuri Foundation, Laitilan Wirvoitusjuomatehdas, Niilo Helander Foundation, the National Audiovisual Institute (KAVI), the Ministry of Education and Culture (OKM), the Finnish Film Foundation (SES), the Sodankylä Municipality, YLE Teema, the French Institute in Finland, Embassy of Mexico.