Esko Salminen
Birth : 1940-10-12, Helsinki, Finland
Kataja
Rousku and Raninen are fleeing their unemployment by setting up a construction company. Occupational illiteracy is not an obstacle and accounting is fine when Rouskun's mate deals with things. The entrepreneurs know that the poor can be, but not artificial. But what's the point for the scratchy women? Especially when Rousku gets to look in the mirror again and find out what kind of father, such a daughter.
Giant guinea pig (voice)
Emilia is a suburban kid. She goes to school, lives with her Mom and sometimes her Dad, and her life couldn’t be more ordinary. But one day Emilia’s pet hamster bites her finger. Emilia gets a secret superpower to transform into Super Furball, who can fly and solve problems with her superpowers. At the same time, the herrings in the nearby Baltic Sea bay are screaming for help because of poisoned water. As the Super Furball, Emilia takes it upon herself to fix the situation and finds ways to be more courageous in her own life.
Lars-Jukka Lampinen
An upbeat comedy about three boys that escape from Soviet Estonia to Sweden via Finland in the 1980s to fulfill their dreams in the free world.
Matteus
A private detective engages in a sexually-charged relationship with a real estate broker.
Jaakko
A Finnish dramedy about an 11-year-old boy dealing with the loss of his parents.
Erkki
Kansliapäällikkö Ståhl
An comedy set in 1960s Helsinki. The story revolves around Elsa, a resolute hatmaker who is in complete control of her life. Besides running her shop, she sometimes doubles as a fortune teller. When Jan, a Czechoslovakian jazz musician and Elsa's old lover comes to town to perform at a "peace and friendship festival", her well-organised life is jolted out of balance.
Eino
Juha Berg is a 30-year-old hopeless drunk in the Kallio neighborhood of Helsinki. Juha doesn't have the first intention of changing his way of life - just the opposite. He really enjoys sundry sexual relationships, adrenalin-inducing violence and, of course, alcohol for which he gets money even if by collecting bottles. But the hilarity in a drunken haze soon gets a run for its money as the passionate Juha falls in love with his AA group leader. The relationship with Tiina progresses quickly to dating and Juha has to make pivotal decisions. Juha has to begin balancing between maintaining a functional intimate relationship and his old lifestyle. Juha's best friend Kristian does his best to sabotage the relationship, and Juha's shaky decision to stay sober is further hindered by Mikael, an expert on German erotica. But how far can you go before there is only one solution left?
Antti Välitalo
19th century drama set on the plains of Ostrobothnia, western Finland, which are controlled by groups of knife-wielding thugs, the toughs. Traditionally, the first-born son inherits everything, so when Esko – a bum and a gang leader – learns that his father will leave the Välitalo estate to his younger and exemplary brother, all hell breaks loose.
Kataja
Antero Rousku is a storeman in a paint store. His job requires raw muscle power, mixing paints and carrying house repair materials around to earn his daily bread. But the basic salary is not enough for Rousku. He also sells a lot of stuff on the side from the storeroom directly to Jylhäkorpi, a frequent visitor, bypassing company bookkeeping. Rousku's colleague in the cellar storeroom is Raninen whose life consists of work, quarreling with his wife, and lottery. Raninen wants to win the main prize but he wants to have the right numbers in exactly the order in which they appear from the lottery machine. Raninen is not the sharpest pencil in the pencil box. Rousku's freedom is threatened by his relationship to the saleswoman Karita. Rousku wants to keep a distance to the woman except in bed. Karita has decided otherwise.
Paavo
The script of this film was very loose and most of the dialog was improvised by the cast
Salomonsen
Ukki
11-year-old Unna travels in time to the stone age with the help of a magic drum.
Eero Lahti - nykyaika
1943: Nine-year-old Eero whose father is killed during the war is brought to Sweden to foster parents to his protection like thousands of other Finnish children. Eero feels lost, particularly as his foster mother Signe behaves very unfriendly. She was expecting a little girl and still mourns for her daughter who drowned in the sea.
Rauno Rämekorpi
Uki Kukkamaa
A police official is assassinated by a sniper through a glass window, this action and its sub sequential investigation introduces us a slew of interesting characters and gets the whole story rolling.
Middle-aged Maire's husband spends most of his time abroad on business. Alone in their large house, Maire fills her empty life by absorbing other people's tragedies from tabloid newspapers. Obsessed by the story about a young single mother whose husband was killed and the killer got away with it, she befriends the young widow who would rather forget the whole event and go on with her life.
Narrator, Finnish version (voice)
The main characters of the film are two small boys who share the throne of Karmapa, the highest office of one of Tibetan Buddhism's main sects and the third in line after the Dalai Lama and Panchen Lama. As with the Dalai Lama, Karmapa is the same soul which reincarnates in each successor to the office, who is identified by omens, portents and other signs. The Karmapa line actually pre-dates the Dalai Lama's, and their respective importance has alternated in the course of history with either the Karmapa or Dalai Lama holding precedence. Only one of the current Karmapas lives in Tibet, who is recognized by the Dalai Lama but controlled by the Chinese government for political ends. The second Karmapa lives in New Delhi, India and was selected by a Tibetan group in exile. The film was shot in India, Nepal and Tibet and features the Dalai Lama as narrator, providing an incisive spiritual and political view of occupied Tibet.
Tarmo Turhapuro
Uuno Turhapuro's brother returns home from Sweden at the same time that Uuno has been seemingly kidnapped.
Kertoja
Finland 1917. Aapo is a single peasantry who tries to live a good life before the finnish civil war begins.
Inspector Max Nummensyrjä
A film group is making movie in the little town. Writer Pentti Töysä interrupts film group's press conference and claims that script is written by him and it is based on true story. Töysä also says that he has written a new ending to the movie and that it reveals an old murder. Not everyone is happy about the new twist.
Jake's Father
One man's quest for revenge in a post-apocalyptic world
Kari Syysmäki
Kari Syysmäki, a Finnish Businessman is on a vacation with his wife in Tallinn. When his wife is away a young man enters their hotel room with a gun. He tells to the businessman that he has just tried to rob a bank, but accidentally shot one of the clerks. Now he's hiding from the cops. But when the bank robber forgets his gun on the table, Syysmäki grabs it and shoots him in the back. After that Syysmäki refuses to travel back to Finland with his wife. He stays in Tallinn and soon he's about to face both the cops and the mob of Estonia.
Lindström
Esa is a small time crook who has been precisely released from prison. He starts to make money by mugging people. One day psychiatrist Lindström rings Esa's doorbell. He has a very strange request: he wants Esa to maltreat him. Esa accepts this request, but he is not aware of Lindström's bad intentions.
Ruotsalainen vakooja
Sergeant Friman is developing an automatic submarine detector that piques the interest of both, Swedish and Russian spies.
Matti Laurila
Russia attacked Finland in late November 1939. This film tells the story of a Finnish platoon of reservists from the municipality of Kauhava in the province of Pohjanmaa/Ostrobothnia who leave their homes and go to war. The film focuses on the farmer brothers Martti and Paavo Hakala.
Dancing teacher
A lawyer pays a visit to Matti Ojanperä (Matti Pellonpää), a bum living under a bridge in the Helsinki harbour, to inform him that he is about to inherit an American aunt of his. The sum 1,000,000 Fmk would be his, if only he meets the qualifications set by his aunt. He must show that he is capable of 'living properly' and possessing a 'respectable occupation and a family he can support'. Otherwise the money would go to a foundation the chairman of which the lawyer himself happens to be!
Crook
Taisto Kasurinen is a Finnish coal miner whose father has just committed suicide and who is framed for a crime he did not commit. In jail, he starts to dream about leaving the country and starting a new life. He escapes from prison but things don't go as planned...
Veikko
Based on a novel of the same name by the Finnish author, Antti Tuuri, this delicious late-80's comedy builds its dark humour on the stereotypical mentality of the northern part of Finland. While perhaps not as entertaining to a person unfamiliar with Finnish traditions, the brilliant acting, directing, plus the warm, beautiful Finnish summer more than make up for the cultural gap.The story begins with a group of brothers with their families coming up to honour the memory of their recently deceased father. Spending time together, opening old wounds and creating new ones... it all boils down to brotherhood. No matter what happens, brothers take care of their own.
Klaus
A bizarre black-and-white film noir reworking of Shakespeare's 'Hamlet'.
Orvo Pruun
Film by Juha Rosma
Aarne Niskavuori
Ilona, a young elementary school teacher, arrives in Hämäläiskylä . He and Aarne, the host of Niskavuori, who is frustrated with his marriage, fall in love. The relationship becomes a public secret. Aarne's wife Martta, who owns half of Niskavuori, wants to hold on to her husband until the last. For Liskisa, the matriarch of Niskavuori, the most important thing is the reputation and honor of the family.
A Polish guest and Finnish engineer both fall for the same mysterious woman.
Suvi's father
A young student seeks direction in his life to counterbalance the studies through female adventures.
Kertoja
The King Without a Heart is a fairytale about of a happy king who has a young daughter and a lovely wife. After the sudden death of his wife, the king becomes so sad that he wants his heart taken out of his chest. The kingdom is turned into an effective society based on reason, and there is no longer place for emotions. When she grows up, the princess tries to make her father see the importance of play and emotions.
Kaarlo
Set during the Second World War in the Finnish war zone.
Arwid
This biographical film celebrates the little-known life of the Finnish novelist and revolutionary Maiju Lassila (Asko Sarkola), born in 1868. Lassila's early years are briefly shown, then the film richly details his active and paradoxically reclusive adult life, beginning with his sojourn in St. Petersburg, working as a businessman. Unable to stay away from politics, he caused the assassination of a high-ranking Czarist and as a result, had to run back to Finland to hide. Once established in the comparative safety of a small village, he taught school in order to support his real vocation as a writer. Always living on the edge of poverty, if not square in the middle of it, Lassila continues to avoid public contact - he keeps his identity low-key and camoflages it by publishing under a variety of pseudonyms.
Eino Leino
Semi-fictitious biopic of Finnish poet Eino Leino, made with a large budget to celebrate the 100th anniversary of his birth. The film concentrates on his relationships with first wife Freya Schoultz and later muse, poetess L. Onerva. His friends include equally central figures of the Finnish cultural scene in the early 1900s, such as painters Halonen and Gallén-Kallela, and composer Sibelius.
Juhani
Manolito
Luigi Cravatto
Pähkähullu Suomi (1967) (Crazy Finland) is a film that pushes every stereotype imaginable about Finland, and then some. Indeed, coming in the same year as Finland’s 50th anniversary, the film’s whole premise is about presenting Finland in hilarious fashion to foreigners and perhaps also making fun of some of the myths of Finnish culture for Finns themselves.
Rallin voittaja Veikkola
Ylil. Heikki Lilja
Kari, Helvi Östman's henchman
Arrested for a murder he didn't commit, American adventurer Bart Lanigan is about to be deported from Finland on a freighter. In the Helsinki harbor, he himself becomes a target for a hit man but manages to escape back to land. Lanigan contacts Arvo Mäki, a womanizing local con man recommended to him as a man he could trust. Lanigan is in Finland to catch an American millionaire businessman, Leonard Weston alias Lawrence Walker, who has fled the USA with the company's monies and begun investing them in Finland. Looking for the mysterious L.W. character while trying to get rid of various hit men, Lanigan and Mäki travel around picturesque southern Finland, joined by a pretty night club singer Marja Salo who won't leave Lanigan alone and insists on marrying him.
Paavo Korpela
Ville Valkonen
A man's body is found on Tähtitorninmäki in Helsinki. Palmu starts to investigate the case, but the scandalous newspaper story causes problems for the police.
Reino Tuomainen
Sten Lehtoja, a married, middle-aged businessman, picks up a young hitchhiker, Elsie, while driving to his summer home. Elsie spends the night and becomes his mistress. Later during the summer, Elsie also begins an affair with Reino, the teenage son of a local storekeeper. Sten offers to divorce his wife, and Elsie, attracted by the prospect of a secure social position, agrees to marry him when the divorce becomes final. One night when the couple are in bed, Reino climbs a ladder and attempts to force his way into their room; he falls and breaks his neck, and to avoid scandal Sten hides the body. But the strain of guilt ruins the romance, and Elsie contacts the police, who arrest her lover.
Soldier in Photo Studio
Finnish period comedy set to the times of WW I. Based on a play by Maria Jotuni.
Leppä
A rich widow is found dead in her apartment in Helsinki due to gas poisoning. The incident is initially thought to be an accident, but inspector Palmu notices that the murderer made a mistake, and so Palmu, Kokki and Virta begin the investigation: who had come to the apartment through the balcony door and opened the gas tap while Mrs. Skrof was asleep?
Ilmari Kosonen
Pekka
A film centered around a popular Finnish song book
Kurre
A story of a mink coat passing from one owner to another binding their fates.
Esko Salminen
Boy
An uptight all-girl school teacher Leena Kataja stumbles upon a handsome artist Pertti Rinne who paints her face on a nude portrait, much to her chagrin. She is intent on keeping the painting out of circulation by stealing it from an art gallery, but the aftermath turns out to be more complex than she anticipated, leading Leena to become involved in various misunderstandings featuring a gang of criminals, inept cops and false murder charges among other things.
Boy in Pool (uncredited)
A closed room mystery begins when an infamous tycoon is found dead in his bath tub. The famous police lieutenant Palmu is summoned to investigate.
(uncredited)
Directed by Ville Salminen and written by Reino Helismaa, the musical comedy film Kaks tavallista Lahtista (1960) tells the story of two friends about Usko (Tommi Rinne) and Toivo (Leif Wager), both of whom happen to have same surname, Lahtinen.
Heikki Holm
The headmaster of a private girls' school is doing her best to maintain strict discipline in the school. In addition to the loosening morals of the students, the warm relationship between two girls is a causing concern.
Olli (uncredited)
Pete and Runt misinterpret the messages of a career choice machine and try to create a career as African dancers.
(uncredited)
(uncredited)
For six hundred years Sweden had controlled most of Finland until the war with Russia that ended in 1809, when Finland became a Grand Duchy of the Russian Czar. This period drama is set during that early 19th-century war and focuses on one of its heroes, Sven Tuuva. Sven is a decent yet not too brilliant soldier, and his exploits are partly balanced here by the charms of a compatriot.
(uncredited)