This year’s Nordisk Panorama pays homage to the diversity of Finnish films. Experimental film, animation and media art have an extensive presence in the overall programme of the festival. Founded in 1990, Nordisk Panorama is an annual film festival for short and documentary films by filmmakers from the Nordic countries. The festival will be held in Malmö, Sweden, from September 21–26.
Three stunning shorts in the competition
Three short films, Jan Ijäs’s Social Connection (2016), Jonna Kina’s Arr. for a Scene (2017) and Mika Taanila’s The World (2017), have been selected for the Best Nordic Short Film Competition of Nordisk Panorama through AV-arkki’s distribution.
Jan Ijäs’s Social Connection has been previously screened in the international competition of Ciné de Huesca Film Festival, Spain. The film’s dialogue has been copied from online forums as is, with no editing. Many times these “faceless” online conversations end up to a very surreal limbo.
Jonna Kina’s Arr. for a Scene is a documentary of two foley artists while they are producing sounds for one of the most famous film scene in the film history (the shower scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho, 1960). The film examines the way sounds are constructed for the use of cinema and what happens when the structures of a film are dismantled into parts.
The images of Mika Taanila’s The World consist of The Man Who Fell to Earth (dir. Nicolas Roeg 1976) evacuated and flipped. In abandoned landscapes, animals, furniture and empty vehicles are left awaiting for disaster.
Kina’s and Taanila’s films are included in the screening “Sound it Out”, screened in September 23 at 13:30 and September 24 at 10:00. Ijäs’s short comedy will be screened in the programme “Too Much Information” in September 24 at 12:30 and September 25 at 19:30.
Finnish Line celebrates the Finnish Animation
Milla Moilanen: Wanted (1998)
Coinciding with the centenary of Finnish independence, Nordisk Panorama presents a selection of 12 Finnish animated short films, spanning the period 1962–2015. The programme will be screened continuously from September 13–27 at five libraries in Malmö: Stadsbiblioteket, Stadsarkivet, Kirsebergsbiblioteket, Husiebiblioteket and Masten2.
The selection includes four modern classics from AV-arkki’s distribution:
Eino Ruutsalo: Kinetic Pictures (1962, 04:49)
Various types of film, glossy, black, picture-line, negative and positive, have been scratched, etched, perforated, drawn on or painted, the aim being to create values enhancing the tension of the picture field.
Milla Moilanen: Wanted (1998, 11:00)
Wanted is based on the archival materials of the Uppsala Institute for racial biology (Uppsala University, Sweden). Today – in this very building – research into genetic manipulation is being conducted by dissecting DNA.
Niina Suominen: A Finnish Fable 2011 (2011, 05:35)
Snapshots of the life of a mannequin in the countryside.
Timo Vaittinen: Central Park (2011, 02:42)
When darkness arrives in the central park mysterious light phenomenons begin their dance.
Timo Wright’s and Hannaleena Hauru’s short films in the special programme
Hannaleena Hauru: The Ice Hockey Film by Heidi (2017)
Hannaleena Hauru’s The Ice Hockey Film by Heidi (2017) and Timo Wright’s Embrace (2016) are included in the special programme of Nordisk Panorama. Both short films will be screened on September 23 in the morning session at 09:30 casting the spotlight on Finland’s pool of filmmaking talent.
Hauru’s short film is a spin-off for her debute feature, The Thick Lashes of Lauri Mäntyvaara (2017). In The Ice Hockey Film by Heidi, Heidi’s fantasy about hockey player Lauri Mäntyvaara is continuously failing. The film studies the encounters of optical and haptic cinema, and the change in the power structures of the cinematic gaze.
Timo Wright’s Embrace shows us an abandoned house, furniture strewn around, discarded. Slowly, a red smoke starts to pour in through the doors. Eventually the whole house is engulfed with the smoke that hides everything from our sight.
Masterclass and an exhibition curated by Mika Taanila at Nordisk Panorama
Mika Taanila: Tectonic Plate (2016)
Mika Taanila has compiled this years Nordisk Panorama collaboration with Malmö Konsthall. The exhibition “Narrative Tremor” looks at the short but rich tradition of experimental film and video art in Finland. The exhibition is open daily from September 9–30. The works range from historical celluloid landmarks to analogue video art, and finally to more recent digital gems. The focus here is on cinematic concept, structural approach and sound, rather than on obsessive storytelling. Mika Taanila will discuss the programme with curator and director of Malmö Konsthall, Mats Stjernstedt, on Saturday, September 23 at 13:00–13.30.
Nordisk Panorama presents a masterclass by Mika Taanila, preceded by a Sunday morning screening of two of his latest works, Branches (2017) and Tectonic Plate (2016) on September 24 at 11:30. Following the screening at 14:00, the session deals with alternative ways of approaching the art of the moving image.
Nordisk Panorama, Malmö, Sweden, 21.–26.9.2017
More information: Nordisk Panorama