Country: Finland
Year: 1972
Duration: 145'
in a small Finnish rural community in the winter of 1969. A man shot four policemen who came to arrest him at his home. Mikko Niskanen went to see him in prison and the script of this fictional film is partially based on their conversation. Eight Deadly Shots clearly shows the state of helplessness of an individual in an unfair society. It is a story about the hard and poor life of a small farmer's family. A cow and a small field are not enough to feed them. There is nothing else: only an itinerant preacher promises the joys of heaven as a liberation from the gloom, alcohol brings numbness, violence a brief feeling of power and life. But none of these can solve anything.
The film starts with the following introduction: "This film does not claim to reproduce a real event although the story is based on it in some important respects. This is the truth I have seen and experienced, born myself in these surroundings".
Biography
film director
Mikko Niskanen
After finishing school at the theatre institute, Mikko Niskanen (1929-1990) first worked as an actor in Kuopio and Jyväskylä. His film career started in 1955, when T.J. Särkkä hired him as cameraman for the company Suomen Filmiteollisuus. He then worked as a camera assistant in short films and also as an actor. From 1958 to 1960, Niskanen studied at the State Institute of Cinematography, Moscow (VGIK), and has made his first film, Boys, in 1962. The two leading themes in Niskanen's work are young people and life in the countryside, and these can be found in practically all of his films.
FILMOGRAFIA
Pojat (Boys, 1962), Kettu ja viinirypäleet (The Fox and the Grape, tv, 1962), Sissit (The Partisans, 1963), Hopeaa rajan takaa (Silver beyond the Border, 1963), Käpy selän alla (A Cone under the Back, 1966), Lapualaismorsian (The Bride of Lapua, 1967), Elokuva jalostavasta rakkaudesta (Film on a Bettering Love, tv, 1967), Asfalttilampaat (Lambs on Asphalt, 1968), Laulu tulipunaisesta kukasta (Scarlet Blossom's Song, 1971), Kahdeksan surmanluotia (Eight Deadly Shots, tv, 1972), Pulakapina (Revolt in Time of Crisis, 1977), Syksyllä kaikki on toisin (In Fall Everything's Different, 1978), Ajolähtö (Let's Get Away, 1982), Mona ja palavan rakkauden aika (Mona and the Moment of Passion, 1984), Elämän vonkamies (The Sly Man of Life, 1986), Nuoruuteni savotat (Work in my Childhood Woods, 1988).
Cast
& Credits
Regia, soggetto e sceneggiatura: Mikko Niskanen.
Director of photography: Seppo Immonen, Kimmo Simula, Juhani Voutilainen.
Editor: Jyrki Rapp.
Sound: Veijo Lahti.
Music: Erkki Ertama.
Cast: Tarja-Tuulikki Tarsala, Mikko Niskanen, Paavo Pentikäinen, Tauno Paananen, Elina Liimatainen.
Production company: Mikko Niskanen per Käpy-Filmi, Finnish Broadcasting Company.
In Finlandia, il progetto 15x15 è stato sviluppato dal Tampere International Short Film Festival Box 305, 33800 Tampere, tel. +358-3-2130034, e-mail kirsi.kinnunen@tt.tampere.fi
Il film è stato scelto da Aki Kaurismäki.
Director of photography: Seppo Immonen, Kimmo Simula, Juhani Voutilainen.
Editor: Jyrki Rapp.
Sound: Veijo Lahti.
Music: Erkki Ertama.
Cast: Tarja-Tuulikki Tarsala, Mikko Niskanen, Paavo Pentikäinen, Tauno Paananen, Elina Liimatainen.
Production company: Mikko Niskanen per Käpy-Filmi, Finnish Broadcasting Company.
In Finlandia, il progetto 15x15 è stato sviluppato dal Tampere International Short Film Festival Box 305, 33800 Tampere, tel. +358-3-2130034, e-mail kirsi.kinnunen@tt.tampere.fi
Il film è stato scelto da Aki Kaurismäki.