Variety's Ten Euro Directors to Watch 2013 / Laulu koti - Ikävästä / Finland, Sweden 2012
Boasting a playful form and emotional content, this touching documentary shows a father and son road trip morphing into a musical journey that examines the fraught history of Finnish immigration in Sweden. You will leave wishing for a soundtrack album. Winner, Best Nordic Documentary, Göteborg festival in 2013.
Boasting a playful form and emotional content, this modest but touching documentary shows a father and son road trip morphing into a musical journey that examines the fraught history of Finnish immigration in Sweden. The best film yet from helmer Mika Ronkainen, the pic uses vintage songs to delve into distressing memories shared by many Swedish Finns, involving shame, guilt, crime and alcoholism. Fortyish musician Kai Latvalehto has an adorable son and a happy marriage, but still feels rootless. Perhaps his feeling stems from a childhood spent in Sweden and a return to Finland as a teen. As taciturn Kai and dad Tauno drive from Oulu, Finland to their former home in Göteborg, Sweden their painfully honest conversations are punctuated by songs written in the 1970s by first generation Finnish immigrants to Sweden, performed live by second generation Swedish-Finnish musicians. The appealing musical performances deserve a soundtrack album.
90 min / Color, DCP
Director Mika Ronkainen
/ Screenplay Mika Ronkainen
/ Dir. of Photography Vesa Taipaleenmäki
/ Editor Åsa Mossberg
/ Producer Ulla Simonen
/ Production Klaffi Productions
/ Contact Klaffi Productions
Mika Ronkainen (b. 1970, Kuusamo, Finland) is a director from Oulu in northern Finland. His best-known films include the documentaries Huutajat – Screaming Men (2003) and Freetime Machos (2009). The first is a portrait of a renowned choir bearing the name Mieskuoro Huutajat, for which director Ronkainen sang in 1994-98. The second focuses on what is allegedly the northernmost rugby team, allegedly also third toughest in the world. Other films: Oulu Burning (Oulu palaa – kaupunki joka katosi, 1998), The World Will Change Soon (Kohta maailma muuttuu, 2000), Before the Flood (Viimeiset vuotoksella, 2000), Car Bonus (Autobonus, 2001), Our Summer (Meän kesä, 2004), and Sentenced – Buried Alive (2006), a documentary about a concert featuring a Finnish heavy metal band. Finnish Blood Swedish Heart took the Grand Prix Dragon Award at the 2013 festival in Göteborg.
Klaffi Productions
Nahkatehtaankatu 2, FI-90130, Oulu
Finland
Phone: +358 104 392 905
E-mail: [email protected]
Mika Ronkainen
Film Director / Producer
Marja Pallassalo
Film Institution Rep.
Kimmo Paananen
Producer
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