80 years old | The director, who is thoroughly familiar with Finnish cinema, remains the messenger of “peasantism”

Film director Anssi Mänttäri is still working actively. He is applying for funding for his new films and is already working on the previous ones. However, there is no hurry as there is no timetable for showing the films.

“Four films are almost ready, but because of the corona, so many films are being tried in the theater to let the traffic jam go by. I think I will get on my feet if I try during it, ”Mänttäri says.

New movies the genre is according to the instructor pimpleism. It is also represented by his previous production. He has no more precise definition of pimple, but the style is reportedly recognizable if he sees the movies.

The style was born forty years ago with the first feature films. At the same time, Mänttäri also started as a film producer.

As early as the 1950s, he and his brother had been able to attend film screenings at the Inkeroinen workers’ house. The task was to nail the advertising posters to the electric poles and to transport the watched film to the railway station and at the same time pick up a new one from there.

“We saw three to four movies a week. At the time, I didn’t even know there were professions in filmmaking other than acting. ”

Acting was the dream of youth, and the first contact with making the film was a side part Mikko Niskasen Sissitin 1963. After that, Mänttäri was asked to remain an organizer for the film company.

The first short film directing took place in 1968, but Mänttäri was a film organizer and production manager for a long time. He saw various directors and productions, was the organizer even Teuvo Tulion In Sensuela (1972).

At the same time, Mänttäri toured as a dance musician and the song director of student restaurants. The song was especially popular with Botta.

“The waiters said that when I was singing, people drank the most, so apparently I knew how to do it. When I first went to my lawyer’s office, an employee immediately came to say that number 56! It was the number of a popular group song. The songs were numbered in booklets so the audience could find the words quickly. ”

Mänttär’s band danced mainly with Bota and KY. When KY turned into a disco, the band played the house’s last dance orchestra gigs and finally took the house piano. It is still in Mänttär’s kitchen.

The first hour was played jazz because the musicians liked it. After that, the dance music began.

“We also put jazz solos in the tango, because if I thought of a tango drum as a drummer, yes, people would dance without a mug. In the first hour, there were 10 to 20 people in Helsinki who came to listen to jazz, and then others came to the ballroom. People were there on the ground from the beginning, but did not dance during the first hour. ”

Mänttärin the first feature film Holy family born in Jörn Donnerin to the company in 1976.

“After my short film, I was sure I wanted to direct. I think pimples only started in my second film Toto. After that, I also knew I could write my own. ”

In the 1980s, several films were completed each year. In addition, Mänttäri was founding the Sodankylä Film Festival.

“I was talking to the Finnish cultural secretaries, and at some point in the evening I and the Sodankylä cultural secretary were awake. In the corridor of the hotel, I suggested that film festivals be set up there. I asked Kaurismäki brothers involved and we chose Peter von Baghin to become a leader. In the first year, there was no idea if anyone would come there, but there were so many people that the wine ran out of the locality. ”

Mänttäri later dropped out of the festival and focused on directing again.

My own favorites from the production are November gray light (1993) and The king leaves for France (1986). The pace of filmmaking has hardly waned in old age.

“It has to be fun at work, and it has been almost without exception. Directing movies is nice, and you can’t mold it at home, ”says Mänttäri.

“Soviet research once came to the conclusion that the world’s heaviest profession is an astronaut, and film directing is the second heaviest. It may be so, but there are quite a few pleasant aspects to it. ”