War

Tuntematon Sotilas (1955) DVDRip (SiRiUs sHaRe)

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Tuntematon Sotilas / The Unknown Soldier (1955)

The Unknown Soldier is one of the most realistic war movies ever made. Arguably, there is no better war film ever made in history.

It is the summer of 1941. An eastern-Finnish machine gun company receives an order to turn in their surplus equipment. The company is transferred to the front lines. The next morning the soldiers wake to the sound of guns - the war has begun. The Finnish troops attack and quickly move across the border. The young, nervous rookies of the company get their baptism of fire, and the men become familiar with death and the hardships of war. Under strength and badly equipped they fight a superior enemy. The lists of heroes and of the dead seem endless. Edvin Laine's epic interpretation of Väinö Linna's war novel "Tuntematon Sotilas" is an entire chapter in the book of Finnish movie history

Kosti Klemelä ... Koskela
Heikki Savolainen ... Hietanen
Reino Tolvanen ... Rokka
Veikko Sinisalo ... Lahtinen
Åke Lindman ... Lehto
Pentti Siimes ... Määttä
Leo Riuttu ... Vanhala
Kaarlo Halttunen ... Rahikainen
Matti Ranin ... Kariluoto
Jussi Jurkka ... Lammio
Tauno Palo ... Sarastie
Pentti Irjala ... Kaarna
Vilho Siivola ... Mäkilä

Director: Edvin Laine

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0048752/

Codecs: OpenDivX 4 / MP3

Audio: Finnish
Subtitles: English

Tuntematon sotilas (The Unknown Soldier) is an epic story and part of Finland's history. The movie is based on famous Finnish novel by Väinö Linna, and it is set in the Continuation War (1941-44), just about a year after the Winter War, between Finland and Soviet Union. The movie is fully black and white.

The Unknown Soldier focuses on a very diverse group of soldiers and is packed with black humour. The different Finnish dialects, that make a huge part of the fun in the jokes, are understandable only for people who know Finnish, but the overall feeling is there in the amazing acting by Reino Tolvanen (Rokka), Kosti Klemelä (Koskela) and Pentti Siimes (Määttä) - to name a few. The most powerful scene is probably the one where Lehto, Määttä and Rahikainen are stubbornly serving their disciplinary duty after refusing to obey their superiors - directly under the enemy aerial fire.

The Unknown Soldier is one of the most realistic war movies ever made. It shows the horrible facts: people die for their home land and it's not pretty. The Finnish soldiers fight against the tenfold enemy in impossible situations. They made heroic acts in their attempt to save their country, and many of these acts have been captured brilliantly in the movie as well. But the true fact of war - death - is always around, even among the war heroes. War does not make one great.

The teaching of The Unknown Soldier is that even a small country has a chance in war against an impossible enemy if the will to protect the homeland is strong enough, the people are stubborn enough and are ready to die for freedom.

The main music in the film - Jean Sibelius' Finlandia is legendary.

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The movie is based on a brilliant and realistic book (Unknown soldier) about the "Continuation War" between Finland and Soviet Union from 1941 to 1944.

After the initial fast attack phase the war turns into sleepy trench warfare (1942-44), then (1944)the company has to retreat and finally stop the storming Red Army forces. There exists a wide spectrum of characters from cowards to heroes, from peasant rank-and-file soldiers to cocky officers. The scale in personalities and changing situations of war, which are credibly described, makes the movie a spectacle.

It helps a lot if one knows some of the underlying history, but the story is rather universal tale of the cruelty of war and the men who have to live and die for their country and different motives. The language with dialects is versatile, but in Finnish only. This old version (1955) is in my opinion better than the later one (1985).

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Edwin Laine's 'Tuntematon Sotilas' has got to be the best sentimentalist war movie ever. It is the story of Finnish war for freedom, war of survival and a war of David and Goljath. The film itself is a tribute to those warriors who saved Finland from communist yoke and occupation. The war cost a lot of blood but Finland survived and came up second in conflict, which was better than total defeat. The film as a whole is nothing but fabulous and the musical score is not just good, it is much more, it is mythological.

The film is based on Väinö Linna's novel 'Unknown soldier' (1954), which concentrates more on soldier stereotypes than historical events. Hietanen is an easy-going and well-liked Sergeant while Lehto is a cold-blooded nihilist. Vanhala is a private, who always finds out something funny about everything and Rahikainen is a soldier who's just trying to survive the war without any personal sacrifices. Rokka is a fearless but lovable hunter, who doesn't get well along with commanding officers. Lammio is a lieutenant, who is hated by his men and who'd like to employ German-like discipline into his company. Koskela is a quiet lieutenant who leads by his example and doesn't want to be called "Sir".

Private Honkajoki is the total clown of the company, who speaks like a propaganda minister or priest, but makes official precept look ridiculous. Honkajoki is also seen manufacturing a 'perpetuum mobile' and carries with his rifle a wooden crossbow, because he has found out that "new type of weaponry is crucially needed in the present large-scale conflict". And there is also private Asumaniemi who says "when will the Russians come so that I could start killing them?" The film has started to live a life of its own. It is no more the same story as told in the book. The Film has become nothing else than the new national epic of Finland. It has taken the place of 'the Kalevala' and is really 'the Iliad' rewritten.

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The Unknown Soldier is a cinematic epic as well as a Finnish film classic. Though I have never read the original novel its easy to see why many Finns find it so compelling. Also, generally as a film it is an extremely strong example of what Finnish cinema is capable of.

The movie is a grade-A example of a good war-film, that doesn't rely solely on gruesome imagery or battle footage, but is interesting because of its strong characterization. The characters in deed are the most memorable part of the movie, despite being somewhat over-blown. The over-all tone also varies nicely, between light-hearted humour as well as extremely bleak imagery.

In all the film has only two major weaknesses. First the slightly dragging narrative responsible for the over-all length of the film as well as occasional lack of authenticity. But even with these weaknesses the film delivers a powerful message.

* Finland's highest grossing movie ever.

* Åke Lindman (Lehto) auditioned for the role of Koskela first.

* Spede Pasanen, Heimo Lepistö, Leo Lastumäki were considered for the role of Rokka that finally went to Reino Tolvanen.

* Almost every actor was 10-20 years older than the character he was playing.

* Director Edvin Laine did not take part of the Continuity War (1941-1944) nor the Winter War (1939-1940).

* Rokka, Hietanen, Honkajoki, Lahtinen and Koskela are the only characters, whose first names are mentioned in the film (Antero 'Antti' Rokka, Urho Hietanen, Yrjö Lahtinen, Ville Koskela).

* The film was released only a year after the novel was published.

* Right after Väinö Linna had published his novel Tuntematon sotilas, Mauno Mäkelä, the manager of Fennada-Filmi made a tentative reservation of the filming rights. But Edvin Laine, who was working for SF (Suomen Filmiteollisuus) at the time, read the novel and immediately traveled from Helsinki to Tampere to meet Väinö Linna to invalidate Mäkelä's reservations. Laine believed so much in the novel that he promised Linna more money for the filming rights than Mäkelä, although he didn't have the authorization to do so. In spite of this ruthless act Mäkelä and Laine later made two films together Täällä Pohjantähden alla (1968) and Akseli ja Elina (1970). These films were based on Väinö Linnas Täällä Pohjantähden alla-trilogy.

* The most expensive Finnish film at the time.

* The film is traditionally shown in television in Finland every year on Independence Day (December 6th).

* When the film was shown in Russia for the first time ever (well after the downfall of the Soviet Union), it received a standing ovation from the audience.

* Has sold in over 40 countries, more than any other Finnish movie.

* Opened in 3 theaters: Rex, Ritz and Tuulensuu, all in Helsinki, Finland. Movie was distributed with 21 copies.

* Production number was SF 166 (Suomen Filmiteollisuus 166).

* One of the few films in which Tauno Palo does not play the leading role.

* Producer T.J. Särkkä tried to evade the tax man in a weird way by spending the profits from this film in a large number of quickie movies. This, in part, led to his company's downfall.

* Åke Lindman was so fed up with playing villains and bad guys that he would have liked to play Koskela, who was the most rightful character in the film. But he ended up playing Lehto, the bad guy of the movie. In spite of his dis-likeness of the character, Lindman was awarded with Jussi-Prize for the role.

* Reino Tolvanen was the only one of the leading men who was not a professional actor.

* Veli-Matti Kaitala was a very popular child actor in the 40s. The role of Hauhia is the only screen-role that he has played as an adult.

* The production of the film started so late in the early of 1955 that the snow that was needed for the Winter-sequences had already started to meld. That's why screenwriter Juha Nevalainen wrote these sequences first that they could be filmed, before the snow was gone.

* Lots of authentic footage from the Continuity War were used in the film. Editors Osmo Harkimo and Armas Vallasvuo edited this footage together with the non-authentic footage and they did their job so skillfully that in some scene it is almost impossible to say whether the footage is authentic or not.

* Among many other actors Topi Kankainen was one of those who was considered to play Rokka. Kankainen finally ended up playing a minor part, Private Korpela.

* Producer T.J. Särkkä originally planned to shoot the film in color, but it would have cost too much, so the film was finally shot in black and white.

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