Ariel

Film/Video ARIEL DIRECTED BY AKI KAURISMÄKI PRESCREENING LECTURE BY FILMMAKER/SCHOLAR ROGER CONNAH, 7 PM FRIDAY, JANUARY 23, 2004, 7 PM $7 ($5 WALKER MEMBERS) AUDITORIUM

LECTURE BY FILMMAKER/SCHOLAR ROGER CONNAH, 7:00 PM

ARIEL, 7:45 PM
Voted Best Foreign Film of the Year by the National Society of Film Critics, Ariel is the most successful of Kaurismäki's films dealing with social realism and stylistic abstraction. When the Lapland mine that he worked for shuts down, Taisto takes to the highway in an enormous Cadillac. On his existential road trip he becomes entangled in a web of crime and a marriage to a dreary meter maid with a young son. 1988, Finland, color, 35mm, in Finnish with English subtitles, 74 minutes.

WITH

Hamlet Goes Business

HAMLET GOES BUSINESS (HAMLET LIIKEMAAILMASSA), 9:15 PM
Kaurismäki's update of Shakespeare's tragedy is set in the corrupt business world of the 1980s. The scheming prince plots to sell his father's shipbuilding empire in order to corner the market on rubber ducks. This cynical film noir features a portly Hamlet with a "heart as warm as a 'frigerator" and the marvelously cast Outinen as the suicidal Ophelia. 1987, Finland, BW, 35mm, in Finnish with English subtitles, 86 minutes.



THIS PROGRAM HAS BEEN MADE POSSIBLE BY THE FINNISH FILM FOUNDATION WITH SPECIAL THANKS TO JAANA PUSKALA, ARETTA VÄHÄLÄ, MARI PELTONEN, AKI KAURISMÄKI, HAIJE TULOKAS, ILKKA MERTSOLA (SPUTNIK OY), THORSTEN SCHAUMANN (BAVARIA FILM), GARY PALMUCCI (KINO INTERNATIONAL), AND BAM CINÉMATEK FOR ORGANIZING THE TRAVELING RETROSPECTIVE. PETER VON BAGH AND ROGER CONNAH APPEAR COURTESY OF THE GOVERNMENT OF FINLAND/DAVID AND NANCY SPEER PROFESSORSHIP IN FINNISH AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA.

PHOTOS COURTESY THE FINISH FILM FOUNDATION