DOCPOINT

By Betsy A. McLane, Ph.D.

DOCpoint Film Festival in Helsinki is full of surprises. Who would think to go to Finland for discovery of new Portuguese and Japanese films, or an intensive master class with Fred Wiseman? That is just what happened this January as the noncompetitive festival celebrated its fifth anniversary. Founded by filmmaker Arto Halonen, it is now ably run by Executive Director Kai Huatari and Artistic Director and noted filmmaker Kristina Schulgin. January in Finland is perfect for staging a documentary film festival. Long cold nights and short cold days make it a time when sitting in a theatre to watch films is very attractive. And the Helsinki populations turned out in numbers slightly greater than in 2005 (need to check number).

Festival headquarters in the center of the beautiful city provides a café for gathering, big rooms for panels, the lively and loud nightly parties, and all the screening venues are within walking distance. Like most everything in Finland, the festival is polite and very well organized and everyone speaks English. There is also an offering for everyone in the program.

There is Dokkino—an event for children and youth to produce and screen their own work—and the Mundo Project in which immigrants and ethnic minorities make films that reflect their own perspectives on Finland. In this country they truly are minorities. Over 70% of the population is pure Finnish and Lutheran in upbringing. This gives me a chance to pose one of my favorite film trivia conundrums: name all of history’s great Lutheran—as opposed to say Catholic or Jewish-filmmakers. A selection of works from the Finnish films schools was also on offer.

Over 20 new Finnish films were showcased, along with other selections from earlier years. The opening night selection “Y in Vyborg” by Pia Andell was one of the most beautiful. It consists solely of spectacular 8mm footage shot between 1938 and 1949 by her parents, husband and wife architects Miri and “Y.” This is coupled with readings of letters exchanged between the two as they were separated in these tumultuous years. The film is one of the finer examples of home movie footage used to create a lyrical new documentary. It also revolves around a theme that is constant for Finns-the country’s fate in the 1938–39 Winter War with Russia and its status as a German ally in WWII. These issues are likewise explored in “Over the Ice” by Seppo Rustaniuss.

Other more modern subjects also attract the many accomplished Finnish filmmakers. Issues of homelessness, conflict in the Mid-East, and many portraits of individuals are tackled. Fortunately, it seems as though the personal diary approach craze has passed by this country. This is not the case with new Japanese cinema. Representing the Yamagata Festival were Kazuo Hara and Shisso Kobayashi, his wife and producer, and with two films, including the world classic “The Emperor’s Naked Army Marches On” (1987), which astonishingly screened to much laughter from young Finns in the audience. According to Hara, younger Japanese documentarians are interested mainly in films about themselves, not in the social issue and “organized” films of the first two generations of Japanese documentarians.

North America was represented by such favorites as “Rize” “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room” “Murderball” “Grizzly Man” “Mad Hot Ballroom” “Three of Hearts” and “Streetfight.” The political high jinks of the latter was echoed, in a subdued Finnish way, by the real-life presidential run-off election that took place in Finland during the Festival. The female incumbent, who has a history of single-motherhood and chairmanship of the country’s largest gay and lesbian group (although not homosexual herself), along with being a running joke on late-night US television as looking like Conan O’Brien, was challenged by a conservative man. His team was handing out free coffee in the city squares. She won, much to the joy of festival participants who were amazed that the challenger even made it to the run-off stage in their proudly self-proclaimed welfare state.

Honored at the festival with the Apollo Award was Jarmo Jääskeläinen. He is credited with starting and enhancing the current documentary boom in Finland since the early 1990s by beginning and nurturing the TV2 Dokumenttiprojekti, the major television venue for documentaries. It was he who first brought many famous international films to Finland and is known as ‘the Godfather of Finnish documentary film.’ A selection of Wiseman’s films was also presented, and his appearances were standing room only. There was a small video screening market for film buyers, meetings and pitches among Nordic country filmmakers, and representatives from Baltic countries like Russia and Estonia, with whom Finland shares a special history. However, for those eager to watch documentaries, DOCpoint is best at presenting a wide range of works that are otherwise very difficult to find. Most are subtitled or have voice over in English, so language differences are only a minor problem. Documentarians visiting Helsinki should also pay a visit to the Finnish Film Archive, a treasure trove of footage that is mostly unknown outside of the area. And of course a really good reason to visit Finland is to sample the national dish—sautéed reindeer served on mashed potatoes with lingonberries—a treat that even vegetarians should try at the traditional Lapi Restaurant, along with an Arctic Bramble Royale: Arctic bramble liquor and sparking wine.

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