22/05/2002 - Cinema the Finnish Way: no money, a few shadows and just one take

Six years after winning a Special Mention from the Cannes jury for Kauas pilvet karkaavat, Aki Kaurismäki is back in competition with The Man Without A Past. Co-produced by Finland´s Sputnik oy, Germany´s Pandora Film and France´s Arte France cinema, A Man Without A Past stars Kati Outinen and Markku Peltola who also appear in the episode that Kaurismäki directed in the ensemble film, Ten Minutes Older, presented in Un Certain Regard. The Finnish director came to today´s traditional press conference comforted by a glass of chilled white wine and was in positive frame of mind. The Man Without A Past was screened this morning at the Palais to a unanimous thumbs up. To date the film has been sold to Italy´s Bim, Switzerland´s Filmcoopi and Greek Prooptiki.

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The Man Without A Past is a sort of fairytale that ends well and is another chance for you to use incoherent and hilarious dialogue...
I like creating worlds where happiness is possible. Today the world has lost all hope and through my films, at least, I try to create happiness that can't be found elsewhere. That, for me, is the meaning of film.

And yet many filmmakers react to similar situations by making protest films...
I am much more interested in imitating genres like Frank Capra´s Life is Wonderful.

What can you tell us about this particular set? How many takes did you shoot for each scene, for example?
The thing that distinguishes us from Hollywood is money. Where I come from, there isn't any. If follows that the first take has to be the right one. On the rare occasions that we get to re-shoot a scene, we always end up using the first one anyway, because it's the most expensive shot. Let me explain my filmmaking philosophy: there´s a man and a woman, with a wall in the background and some light and shadows. First the woman disappears, followed by the man and the wall. The lights go out and all that is left are shadows. Cinema is nothing but shadows.

Do you rehearse your actors?
We only talk to each other after the scene is in the can and it´s too late.