IFFI-2008 - International Film Festival of India

AKI KAURISMAKI
IFFI-2008
Rocky VI (1986)
Rocky VI is a nine-minute black-and-white short parody of Hollywood
flick Rocky IV. The film stars Antti Juhani "Silu" Seppälä as Rocky and
Sakari Kuosmanen as Igor, his Soviet opponent. In the film, the two
boxers fight at Töölön kisahalli in Helsinki. The much bigger Igor
quickly knocks out Rocky and wins the match. In the title, the letter VI
does not actually represent number six, but an inverted IV, of Rocky IV,
the specific film parodied. The fifth film in the original Rocky series,
Rocky V, was released almost four years after this parody.
Thru the Wire (1987)
In this six-minute-long film, Nicky escapes from prison somewhere
between Alabama and Utah, sometime in the future. He looks for his girl in
the bars and hotels. All he can see in his new freedom is that no one cares for
the future of human culture
Those Were the Days (1991)
A sad and lonely cowboy wanders about the streets of a big city with his donkey,
searching for a place where he can set up his camping kitchen and his tortured
heart. A story told in five minutes.
These Boots (1992)
This five-minute film marks typical Kaurismaki sense of humour. It
begins with the title "History of Finland 1952-1960" and cuts to a shot of
a baby with a full size male head and the requisite Leningrad Cowboy
hairstyle and curled tip boots. The parents have the same hairstyle -
although the man is balding, so it's his beard that stretches in front of his
face for a foot and a half. The child is thrown out of school for drinking
vodka. When he gets married he and his bride are riding on a tractor. At
the funeral of his parents, their curled boot tips are sticking out of the
coffins.
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