Rough cut

Now, the first, rough cut of the short film has been edited. It wasn´t very easy job. Every day I faced my own mistakes, my inadequacy as a director and a cameraman. It is clear to me now that a project this size will require atleast knowing camera-assistant, which I knew but couldn´t get. But perhaps it would anyway be the best to get a cinematographer to do the job.
Russian director Kossakovski says that it is essential that director operates the camera also, and this is true in some sense, like when you are shooting a documentary, following some event, you must feel the situation, operate the camera like it is a part of your self, but what I came to realize that in the pre production, when I couldn´t do very accurate storyboards, and thought that this will all be clear to me in the location and the situation, that atleast all the types of shots needed should be in some paper, and someone should watch that all these shots are taken. This is the thing I didn´t do, but fortunately, it doesn´t do much damage to the film. But for future projects, this must be done.
I really can´t say what the film will be like to the audience who haven´t been a part of the making prosses or who don´t know anything about it. I really don´t. For me it seems a bit insane film right now. And there is much work to be done to get some scenes working. We also have to do some afterrecordings for the sound. There had been some problems in some scenes.
Short movie making is trying to correct the mistakes made in the previous stage.

it has ended

YEAH! Last day of shooting was today! I must say, I´m happy. I don´t know will this be a "good short film" but I´ve learned so much I can´t even begin to write the things I´ve learned here. I know so much more now about myself and other people. I´m really tired.
Today we drove to Helsinki to shoot some interior shots. Crew was a bit frustrated about the fact that we had to shoot in Helsinki. We shot the scene where they get the 8mm camera, dream scene number 1 and the beginning scene at my apartment. It was really hot and sweaty. Marja did the part of Anina nicely, altough I was so messed up that I´m sure that no one understood what I said today. I just mumbled and said half words.
But we got all done. Marja seemed a bit stressed out, which is natural, this was I think the third or fouth time I met her. Nice person. "The dream girl" Laura was also really co-operative in those awfull conditions inside the small apartment.
Jarno was relaxed and seemed bit confused but happy about the fack that we shot at his place.
Tero Nummela came and did the part of "room mate" really nicely. Just the right man for the job. We re-decorated my place with lots of beer cans and so on. Netta put some nice mud on the floor of the bathroom. Maspe also came around and helped and slept in the car.

Now, when everything is over (ecxept I must return everything tomorrow, keys,cameras etc) I think that even if this movie turned out to be bad, which can happen, if I loose my mind during the editing or something, this experience has been something that can´t be replaced. Everyone who has been in this project has been really great. The fact that everyone did his or her part, on time and listening my uncomprihensible talking, is amazing. Nothing bad even happened. One scene had to be changed. Nothing more. Weather was great! Everything fell in its place, actors, sponsors, shooting locations and timetables... Only one I can plame for things done wrong is me. Everyone else has been great! And I´m already proud of my self that I managed to do this. Remembering that this is not a schoolwork, this is just some short movie I made in my own time. School short movies are very different things. I could have just been in some bar all this time, complaining that I never do anything. But instead I did this! Altough it destroyed my social life for a while ;)
Also, this has been something that had to be done. When the movie is finished, its an end of an era. 3 years ago was the last time I cut my hair. 3 years ago was the beginning of that year which was the inspiration for that movie, when, at the end of that year, wrote this script. 3 years ago I moved to Kouvola. Now Juippi is moving to Kouvola, going to the same school I went back then.. During these shootins I talked to someone I haven´t talked for a while, (whos been also inspiration for the original script.) When the movie is finished, edited and so on, I´m going to cut my hair. And let´s hope I´m going to be a decend citizen and get a jog or something. ;) not likely. But things that have gone trough my mind last 3 years are now getting to some ending point along this movie and other projects I´ve done during these years. Let´s hope that this is not an end for everything, just that a new phase will begin.
I´ll report here how the editing and dvd-doing and these kind of things are going. So keep on reading! Also other stuff will appear here. When ever I have something to say. (Written in a half-a-sleep-state of mind)

day 9 , and some explanations

Today went okay. We had this rig thingy to be used over the hood of the car. we shot some nice car driving scenes. It was really hot and I sat behind the front seats in between of the front and back seats. It was nice but I got a bit carsick. (picture by Maspe)

But I must write about something else today. In the paperarticle of Kymen Sanomat was mentioned three times that this is an autobiogrhaphical movie. I´m dissapointed cause I tried to explain to the journalist, that this is not an autobiographical movie, but of course, there is not many things happened in my life, that have affected me strongly, and ofcourse, the inspiration of this movie is in one spesific time of my life, and yes, this movie takes place in Karhula, and many locations have some meaning to me personally. So, in that sense and that sense only, this is an autobiographical movie, but like Jesse said in movie Before Sunset, "Isn´t everything autobiographical?" But there is so much more in it. Things I´ve seen in other movies, things I´ve read in books, things I´ve heard, things I wish had been or things I´ve dreamed. All this is also part of my life, but more commonly these kind of sources of inspirations are considered fiction. One could ask why.
I can not understand why anyone does anything if he or she doesn´t have some personal reasons and emotions connected to it, which need to be expressed. I see no other reason to do art or science or anything what you do in life. Isn´t everything about dealing with your exeperiences and the emotions your mind holds inside of it, about different things in life.

And other thing, why couldn´t I do an autobiographical movie, in the traditional way? I don´t see that you need to be old or a war hero to do a thing like that. (altough it might give you a good reason for it) I´ve seen this autobiographical movie made by a guy when he was 30 or something, and it was one of the most interesting movie I´ve seen a while at that time. Movie called Tarnation. Check it out. It was just about how messed up that guy (and his family) is. So anyway, my point was, that it isn´t all about what you have gone trough in life, but how you deal with your life and what can you get out of it, what ideas, how you express your emotions and impressions and what do they mean to you. Cause that is all that is important, all what matters.
I have no reason to do a shortmovie about some korean kickboxing hero, who uses some drug I´ve never heard of and likes to eat raw fish. That might be interesting to some people, but it is highly unlikely that I could get any personal connection to that kind of story. I´m sure that I could find something that I could relate, but maby you get my point.
Stop.

days 6, 7 and 8

I haven´t written here for a while. Been very busy and tired. On wednesday we shot the leaving-scene at Äijänniemi. We got some nice footage there, and the scene got some new dimensions when we found a nice bonzai-looking tree. I shot the scene under that. That was the Final scene with Laura, who plays Kevät. She didn´t want to leave the shootings, so she did some sound assistant job! Henry had some personal reasons, so he had to leave a bit early. That was ok, I got the scenes that I wanted. Also the "dreamscene2" was shot. I think I was really tired on wednesday, cause I cant remember anything from that day after shootings..Juippi, Kake and Maspe went to Hamina to see some "horny piano playing" by Vilho. I was too tired to go.

On Thursday we had to shoot the first scene at Karhula, cause Atte has to leave to Tampere in the evening. What I didn´t realize was that on first Thursday of the month was a market day. So the market place which supposed to be empty was full of people. I got very upset. We shot the scene at the bus station. Thats a bit bad. I don´t know what I´m gonna do with the start of the film. Shit.
After this we went to Sam´s pub to shoot some indoor scenes of Juippis place. I couldn´t concentrate, and some things went wrong. But we got some ok material from there. I wish I had been more sharp that day. But I guess this is getting to me, the stress, little sleep.. all that. After this one journalist came to do a piece on this movie. Me, Henry and Kimmo talked very confusing things to her. I was in conflict with many things which I said at the other interview to KymenSanomat. This interview will be published at Ankkuri, and possibly in PK..or something. Also the radio interviews and newspaper interviews will be available at my webpages as soon as I get to Helsinki, and have the time to put them there.
On Thursday evening we wen´t swimming, and ate some pizza. I fell a sleep at somepoint, and woke up with my jeans and shirt on at 3:30 a.m.


Today, Friday we shot some hitchhiken scenes. Things wen´t ok. Nothing special. End is near.

day 4 -the party & day 5 - stealing the car

Yesterday I didn´t have time to write here, cause we stopped shootin about 22 p.m. and after shooting and cleaning up the beach we came to my place and watched some material with Henry, Kimmo and some other people. Anyway, the party scene worked out quite well. We were late, right at the start, so we were in a hurry. When I arrived I was shocked by the view at the beach, cause there were quite a lot of people there. This was my first big scene with lots of people, so it took a while to get things going. Food and drinks had to be served, things had to be in the right place, we had to shoot certaing things, improvice others. Challenging.
Only now I realized that altough there were a lot of people there, many of those who I thought would come, didn´t. Thats a shame, cause people had fun, and a lot of Laitila beer and cider was left over. Almost no one drank the red wine!! People should do things more! not just work and be scared!!
I must correct something, about the actor of Mesoaja, Antti Filppu. At no point, was the situation like I described before "monday was out of the question too" - like that. Filppu just wanted to know if I had a back up plan, if things would go wrong. Of course I didn´t. I know things can go wrong, but I trust life, and if Antti wouldn´t have shown up, Im sure I would have come up with something else. I just got scared, when he called, and misundestood and paniced. But anyway, Antti came, and things went nicely with him! Some really strong scenes were shot.
Also Henry had some really nice, and fresh ideas about his scenes with Susanna. Kimmo and Laura did their part just the way I imagined. Juippi on the other hand had some cards up his sleeve, he got a bit drunk and expanded his role a bit by doing some demonic movements.
So everything worked really well. Exept I would have wanted to film the band more, but we ran out of battery for the camera. But we filmed the band enough I think. The music sounded really nice by the way! Thanks guys!!


Today we shot the car stealing scene, and the scene with Sivullinen jumping on another car. We changed the actor for Sivullinen, he´s now Atte Häkkinen, who was a great choice for the role. THings worked out today really well, altough I forgot to put my shoes on in the morning. I went to the location without any shoes?!? Well Maspe, my bro who has been a real help in these kind of situations went to get them. And I must say something about our catering services. Its awesome! My parents do everyday a really nice meal for us. Our film wouldn´t be anything without them! Also Sami Ristiniemi came to do the role of an angry and closeminded businessman, and did that really nice! He gave us some umbrellas also.
Juippi was really nervous, cause this was his first "big day" with some lines. I expected something like this, cause he couldn´t practice the lines cause they were given to him yesterday, cause matti wrote them just 2 or 3 days ago. But I think that Juippi did his role fine, but I think that he himself doesn´t think like that. But he shouldn´t stress so much.
I gues thats that. Things are going a lot easier than in the beginning! This is fun!

day 3

I forgot to mention, that yesterday, when Henry did his fall at the "mountain scene" he really fell a long way along the down hill lawn. He couldn´t stop sliding down and his back got a bit hurt during that. Anyway, he´s fine now.

Today started out badly again. When the actor for Mesoaja called and told that he fainted lastnight and that he cannot come to the set to day. I got really upset when he said that tomorrow would be out of the question too. I tried to explain that couldn´t be, but we didn´t get to an agreement. I had to go shooting, so I told him that today he wouldn´t have to come, but we´ll talk later. We shot some nice scenes with Henry and Kimmo, everything went quite smoothly. Exept each and every one of us was badly burnt by sun, and I didn´t have any hat, so I wore the hats of the crewmembers (see the picture, taken by Netta Kervinen).
When we shot with Laura and Kimmo, Laura was very nervous, but i think she did her part quite well. I was nervous too, and when the two of them walked along a path behind my parents house, the sight was a bit scary cause they looked like me and someone from the past..! ;) I forgot to put on the progressive mode from the camera, that was a shame, cause when we looked at the material, it looked a bit bad, without the deinterlacion thing. But it´ll be fixed later. Yep, thats that. Tomorrow is a big day.

second day

Today, things went okay I guess. Things were more in my control, crew was energic and so on. The day didn´t start so well anyway. First, last night I woke up in the middle of the night and remembered some shots that I had forgotten to shoot. I was very upset ( I punched the wall couple of times). Then I fell a sleep. Then, at about 6 am I woke up to a terrible stomach ache. I couldn´t move. My belly hurt so much. I managed to get to the kitchen, where I almost fainted. My eyes went blurry and ears were humming. I drank couple glasses of water and started to feel better. Then I realized that I hadn´t drank anything for many many hours. Slowly I felt better, and fell a sleep again. Then, when we arrived at the shooting location, I realized I had forgotten my camera home. I drove back to get it. After this everything went nicely. We shot the scene at the "mountain" it looks like it was shot in a studio!? weird. But it looks good. Then we shot some scenes I had forgotten.
I should have believed that first days are always bad, and no important scene should be shot. But this was a matter of schedules, cause Susanna, who plays Tuuli, wouldn´t have managed to the shootings later. But anyway the parts with Tuuli and Olavi, of the scene 11, which was shot on friday, are covered, and they are the core of that scene, but where to cut in, and how to get Tuuli to the scene is now a little problem, but since I´m so great editor, I´m sure I´ll manage.

I think we´ll get a shortmovie out of this. But it well be a bit od I think. 2 days have gone, 8 to go. This is a massive project to do. Now, I know that I hate that goddam glidecam. But some scenes well be shot with that anyway. Tomorrow some scenes with Laura, who plays Kevät.

Picture is taken by Netta Kervinen, click to see it in larger scale.