Finnish Short Films Successful in Berlin


Story by KYKY

KYKY, a brand new short film event was held in the Finnish Institute in Berlin, Germany. A group of students from TAMK UAS School of Art and Media and Jyväskylä University of Applied Sciences organized an evening that included six finnish short films and a panel discussion with two directors, AJ Annila and Maria Kaurismäki. Pekka Ollula, who is studying producing and creative thinking, and sound designer/composer Miro Laiho a.k.a. Michael Law joined the discussion about the films that were shown, culture export and finnish short films in general.


KYKY was launched in fall 2008 by Jussi Laaksonen, Pekka Ollula and Pauli Kopu. Later, Emmi Nuorgam joined the group. The connections to the Finnish Institute in Germany came from inside the group and the co-operation between the our group and the institute was tremendous.

Yesterday, on April 23rd, it was finally time to present the films to the audience in Berlin. And what an audience it was! The co-workers at the institute counted approximately 110 participants, which is a great number! The people enjoyed the show, the applause was nice after every film and many people took part in the panel discussion - that could be called a successful night in Berlin. It was nice to recognize, how everybody was able to make international connections and to discuss about the Finnish film scene in general with a nice glass of wine or even juice.

A project like this made it possible for us to give the audience a nice piece of Finnish culture. The feedback was very positive and we are looking forward to take more Finnish short films to other culture institutes all over the world, which was the main goal to achieve with KYKY. Thank you Berlin, we'll be back with more films and creative ideas! If you are interested getting your film abroad, please don't hesitate to contact us.

The films:
Winterlong Director: Timo Puukko
Hard Student IV: The Ultimate Battle D: AJ Annila
Ennustus – Rain Must Fall O: Anna-Kaisa Haapala
Norjalainen huora - Norwegian Whore D: Timo Vuorensola
Sivutyö – Sideline D: Maria Kaurismäki
HERA D: Sanni Rajapolvi


The Finnish Institute in Germany, presentation of films (in German)
Hard Student IV, Rain Must Fall, Sideline and Hera are made by TAMK School of Art and Media students.

Rain Must Fall and Hera are also screened at Tampere Art Factory May 15-16