 Selection Committee at work. |
Real gems are hard to find
I have been allowed into the house where the selection committee has been working for twelve days and nights in order to select the films into the International Competition of Tampere Film Festivals. They still have to work at full steam until the last moment, so I've been asked not to bother them too much.The room is full of videotapes and folders. They pour out from everywhere. A couch is opened up on the floor and in the middle of the room there are two tables. Two sets of VCR's and a TV are placed on a bookshelf. The four members of the committee, Elizabeth Marschan, Reijo Nikkilä, Marita Hällfors and Simojukka Ruippo, and their secretary sit bent over their papers for the final countdown.
The committee has already watched about 1,500 films of a maximum length of 30 minutes. Think about it: if all the films were 15 minutes long, it would take 375 hours, over two weeks, of round-the-clock viewing.
"We usually started watching the films after breakfast at around 10 o'clock each morning. We'd keep on watching the whole day. Most days we didn't even go out to eat but ordered food in. Then we'd continue until the small hours," Reijo Nikkilä describes the fortnight spent in the idyllic wooden house to the west of Tampere.
First priority is quality
At the beginning, all the members watched the films together. When it became obvious that they did not have enough time, they split up into pairs to see more films in a shorter period of time. The night before last, they found another box of over 100 films waiting for selection.Four times they got together to discuss which films would be chosen. "Everyone had different ideas on what was genuinely new, and what had been seen many times before. We all look at the films with a different eye: a musical person listens to the music, a photographer pays attention to the images. We weren't too attached to our own viewpoints, so everything came together very nicely," says Elizabeth Marschan.
"The most difficult part of it all has definitely been to try and find the gems among the huge number of films sent in," Elizabeth Marschan explains.
"Our first priority was the artistic quality of the films. The idea of the film and the way it was realised as well as the connection between the form and the contents also had an influence on the decisions. We wanted to take the audience into account, and tried to pick out films that would please the paying customers, too."
"Sometimes it's difficult to draw the line between pleasing the audience and making it see more dramatic elements, too. We believe we have to have some responsibility in that respect. Besides, it's not easy to know what the audience likes."
Films come from 30 different countries
According to Marschan, the films were of the same high quality this year as previously. Among the student films, there were also some gems.The international competition is truly international. This year, the selected 80 short films come from 30 different countries. Most of the selected films have a Western cultural background, i.e. they come from countries like the UK, France, Belgium and Canada, but they also include films from the Republic of Korea, India, South Africa and Iran.
"The most important thing for us, though, was the quality of the films. We are not aiming at a multiplicity of nationalities to enter the competition. We can't give any privileges to the representatives of the Third World, for example. However, I think it's nice that so many countries are now represented," Reijo Nikkilä comments on the final choices.
Different cultures bring along different languages. Marschan agrees that the inequality of the languages influences the choices, as it is easier to understand films made in English. Some of the films did not include any translation at all, so the committee had to be linguistically skilled.
"I interpreted some of the French films for the others, and it was quite rough. After that you really appreciate the film makers who have considered their international audience by including a translation," Elizabeth Marschan explains.
Text: Kirsi Hietanen
Picture: Anuliina Savolainen
Translation: Sini Paronen