6 days, filming the real life Beat

I just returned from Tampere. I was an assistant director, production manager, lightcrew, grip and catering-man in this documentary, or ethno-fiction. We shot two guys who lived in Tamepere, the film is called "Hulttiot" translated maby "Scoundrels". Director was Jaakko Ruuska, and the guys we shot were Jaakkos friends Joona and Ilmari. The thing was that these guys acted themselves. So it was kind of fiction, but a documentary, cause we never took a second take and the guys acted this kind of enhanced reality. It is not about improvisation, cause they are not actors and are not ment to act.

These shootings really affected me. First, my thoughs about Tampere as an interesting, quite small but a big city, got confirmed and enhansed by visiting all these interesting places we shot in. And the guys, Joona and Ilmari were something straight out of some Jack Kerouacs book. Really interesting personalities and characters with interesting lifestyles, thougts and tales. The way the guys talked and behaved affected me aswell. This strange, slow and thoughtfull way of talking and moving. The fact that this film has a lot of similarities with my own "We can not stay here" shortfilm (which wasn´t accepted to Tampere film fest by the way), but it happened for real, where as my own film was based on my own life but the style and events and all that was totally fiction. But these guys lived it.

We left from Helsinki at around 07.30 a.m. on Thursday morning. We drove to Tampere with 2 cars, one big wan with all the lights and one smaller car. Jaakko changed the timetables cause the weather wasn´t good enough for the scene we planned to do first. We drove to TTVO to pickup some lights and light crew members. One of these were this guy, Anton who had promised to give us a place to stay during these shootings. He was a nice guy! We went to Joonas place, which was in the nice neighborhood of Pispala, this old wooden house, painted with this hippie-style paintings from the inside. Joona wasn´t home, so we had to wait for a while, we started to put the lights on and did some hazardous light set ups. Jaakko wanted to be alone with Joona, so me and Anton left and Jussi Rantala (who was recording the sound for the first 3 days) stayed there, sitting behind the door, recording sound.
We went to Antons place. It was an old building, fromerly the flat had been somekind of kindergarten, the nameplates were still on the door "Lastenseimi". Six people lived in this flat. We stayed in Antons room, which was a mess, he apologized about it. When Jaakko called few hours later we went to pack the lighst and equipments and went to eat. The place we ate in had some problems getting us the receipt, propably they usually never give one to the customer.
In the evening Jaakko went to sleep at Joonas place, and Jussi went to some gig somewhere, so I stayed at Antons. Which upset me a bit, cause I was tired and felt that I didn´t have the strength to communicate and get to now some new guys (there were some Antons friend also).

Well anyway, On the next day, Friday a girl named Jenni arrived from Turku. She came to do some camera-assistant job. We had a strange day coming. The shootings took place in a public sauna. We had few hours to put all the lights up and the camera had to be in the sauna, warming up 2 hours before shooting, otherwise it wouldn´t work properly. We had only one hour to shoot all the shots in the sauna. Ilmari arrived late and we had to start without him. The sauna was full of local sauan-men, who were all happy about the fact that the sauna was free ´couse of us shooting there. The guys didn´t mind us shooting, and I think we got some nice shots there. One of the guys said to Ilmari "Listen, Just cut your hair, go to army and then come here with us to sauna and you´ll be a man.." something like this. Ilmari is a slim young guy with curled long hair, he looked funny between these big sauna-men. After shootings we went to some place called Jalla Jalla to eat.
In the evening we went to see a play directed by Ilmari and Joona acted in it. It was held in this culturehouse in Pispala. The house was full of culture-people, some sat on the floor, drank whisky, some just hanged around. The play was lit whit an old 8mm projector. and all the characters looked like characters from the silent movie era. The play was really scary and at times really intensive. It had no dialogue, someone just played violin to do the sound. The story was something that I couldn´t grasp or put in to words right now, but it didn´t seem confusing. Something about having a child, being a false mother, about image and responsibility I guess. It had a lot of blood in it. After this stunning experience me and Jenni went to town and to cafe Europa to drink some beer. I saw Eci there too.
We had some troubles getting in to Antons apartment, cause he wasn´t home and none of the people who lived there knew that we stayed there. But we got in.

On Saturday we shot at Anttila and on the street near it. A new guy, Patse, came to help us out. I arraged a parking place for us in front of the Anttila. First we shot some scenes at the street where Ilmari and Joona walked on the street and Ilmari suddenly starts to shoot Joona with a funny looking toy gun. Then the guys run inside Anttila and steal some money from a whisingfountain. I think these scens worked out really well. Ilmari and Joona seemed happy about this day also, Ilmari was a bit resistant during the first two days. This old lady came to talk to us. She asked what we were doing and then suddenly started to tell with a fragile voice that she went to work at age of 12 and never got treated as a child, doing a mans job. A nice old lady. On saturday evening we went to at at RAX buffet and had some nice moments there. Joona put some espresso to his coke-cup and then filled it with icecream..things like this. We all ate too much and felt bad afterwards. On the evening Jenni and Jussi left and Svante joined us. He came to record the sound.

ADDED later: I had a dream one night that someone was filming me and when we looked the material I was Ilmari..! Scary.

On sunday we first shot some nice scenes on this warehouseplace, the kind of which are always located near trainstations, you know what I mean. We got some nice shots there. It was really cold and my toes were frozen, and jaakko made me run back and forth to the van. After this we went to eat some overprized chinese meals. I was stressed cause I was responsible for the money.
After this we went to Ilmaris place, to shoot a scene with Ilmari and his stepfater. I thought that It wouldn´t work out, that it would be too fictional, you know. But what amazed us all was the thing that it worked out really well. The Stepfather was supposet to talk to ilmari about life values and getting job and this basic stuff you tell a young guy who doesn´t work or study. And I think that the style of Ilmari and the step father were so completely different, and eventough they were clearly in these roles, it worked out nicely, cause Ilmari replied in his own weird kind of way, and they clearly had gone trough these conversations many times, so it wasn´t a problem to do them again in front of the camera. "I want to turn in to a bird" replied Ilmari, when is stepfater asked him what he is going to do with his life.

Monday was a easy day, Jaakko shot alone with Ilmari some scenes and we went to help in few shots. There was a lot to arrange and to do, so a day with a little less shooting was welcome.
On Tuesday, the final day, we shot one shot where Ilmari left his apartment, for real, and moved to Helsinki. We had to pack his things to our equipment van. Then we went to shoot some scenes to a place where people went to swin in the winter to a hole in the ice. It was a complex shot, we had to wait for a train to go on a bridge nearby, cause jaakko wanted Ilmari, Joona, a swimmer and a train to same shot. The swimmer Jaakko had called didn´t show up so I had to talk to some people there who agreed to swim when we asked.
After these shots we shot under a bridge, some nice improvised drumming. Then we ran out of film. But I thing we got all shots needed.
We left tamepere and returned all the equipment and went to exodus to talk in the evening, but I was so tired that I left aroun 00.15 a.m.

Now I must do some reports and calculate all the receipts.

But a really nice shootings, really gave me things to think about and some perspective to things. It was also fun to do things with a small crew, this was nothing like the previous shootings I´ve written about here.

I hope that things go well for Ilmari and Joona, Joona is going to India in few months and Ilmari moved to helsinki to do some theater things. The shootings continue during the spring, we´ll see if I am taking part in them again.