The festival kicked off with the Finnish premiere of Close Your Eyes (2023) by Victor Erice who visited Midnight Sun Film Festival as a guest in 1995. The almost three-hour-long soothing film calmed the audience, making them question the role of cinema in the battle between oblivion and memory. Before the start of the sold-out screening the festival-goers could be heard discussing the festival’s unique atmosphere that remains from year to year. People of different ages and origins gather in Sodankylä for one reason: love for cinema.
Selma Vilhunen’s Four Little Adults (2023) was also screened in the late morning, and the audience enjoyed the honest depiction of polyamory. The film will be screened for the second time on Sunday, when the screening will be opened by one of its stars Oona Airola.
In the early evening hours Cinema Lapinsuu filled up with the sold-out opening screening. In the opening speech, the artistic director of the festival Timo Malmi highlighted the importance of cinemas and festivals for experiencing cinematic art. The opening film was filmmaker guest Leos Carax’s masterpiece Les Amants du Pont-Neuf (1991). The director arrived in Sodankylä just in time for a loud welcome from the audience.
The beach-themed masterclass by Olaf Möller began in a spectacular atmosphere with Alberto Lattuada’s The Boarder (1954). Before the film, Möller welcomed the audience back to Sodankylä accompanied by a loud applause. The audience listened silently as the curator with plenty of background information, humour and fun figures of speech, shared behind the scenes information about scandals that the film had originally caused. In addition, he showcased censorship alterations found in the archives that would seem absurd to modern audiences and that were added back into the film about a decade after its release. In his familiar, passionate manner Möller reminded that the set of beach films will continue on Thursday with Gidget Goes Hawaiian (1961) by Paul Wendkos, setting the expectations of an eager audience high.
As the evening sun shined, Michelangelo Frammartino’s sold-out modern masterpiece The Four Times (2010) generated a winding queue. The movie is set in the robust home region of Frammartino’s own parents. Describing the milieu, Frammartino shared in the beginning of the screening: “There animals and things have a soul too.” Resembling both a documentary and an art installation, the poetic film with peculiar sound design depicts the movements of a soul and spirit between bodies and different states.
Katja Gauriloff’s Je’vida (2023) was screened around the same time. The big tent was filled up with big emotions as the world’s first ever film in Skolt Sámi shook its audience. The black and white frames captured the atmosphere as it moved effortlessly between memories, dreams and generational trauma and love. After the film finished, it was reminded that Gauriloff will join other Finnish filmmakers for a discussion in the Small Tent on Saturday.
While the sun was still blazing in the late evening, the first musically accompanied screening of this year’s festival took off in Cinema Lapinsuu. Janne Haavisto & The Shubie Brothers entertained the audience with joyous music while a Finnish short film Olipa kerran talvi – ja lunta (1934) was playing. The later part of the screening was reserved for the first short film of the originally made-for-TV show Decalogue/Dekalog by Krzysztof Kieslowski.
After midnight, filmmaker guest Aslı Özge opened her film All of Sudden (2016) in Cinema Lapinsuu. Around the same time Teemu Nikki was present for Death Is a Problem for the Living (2023) which he both wrote and directed. The deeply dark humour of the movie made the audience laugh as well as gave them goosebumps.
The first day of the festival started with warm reunions and large emotions. Such a great way to start the festival and midnight sun celebrations!
Picture: Axa Sorjanen