Made for television in 1972, Mikko Niskanen’s four-part, five-hour work about moonshine-drenched desperation in a rural village is opening in a new restoration at New York’s Film Forum.
In the woods next to a gleaming lake, several men secretly drink moonshine, cook fish and sing songs by a fire in the waning light. It’s one of numerous vivid scenes involving illicit alcohol in “Eight Deadly Shots” (1972), a gripping miniseries by the Finnish actor and director Mikko Niskanen (1929-1990) about desperation and addiction in a rural community, and the events leading up to a shocking crime.
An important work in Finnish film history that deserves wider acclaim, “Eight Deadly Shots” was made for television and also later edited down for theatrical release. The original version, more than five hours long and in four parts, will screen at Film Forum in New York from March 31 to April 6 in a new 4K restoration by the Film Foundation’s World Cinema Project, Yleisradio Oy, Fiction Finland ry and Fondazione Cineteca di Bologna at L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory. It will also screen at other U.S. venues, including the Cleveland Institute of Art Cinematheque in April and the American Cinematheque in Southern California in June.
Niskanen’s searing tale was inspired by the real-life killing of four police officers by a Finnish farmer, but it is grounded in memories of the rural area where the director was raised. A statement at the beginning of each episode reads in part, “Everyone may have his own truth, but this is the truth I saw and experienced, having been born into these surroundings, having lived this particular life, and having studied these matters.”
Summoning a fierce unity of vision, Niskanen directed, wrote and produced all four episodes, contributed some of the cinematography, and took on the demanding central role of a struggling farmer, Pasi. Tarja-Tuulikki Tarsala played Pasi’s wife, Vaimo, and Paavo Pentikäinen was Pasi’s friend Reiska, but the rest of the cast were nonprofessionals. The settings also convey a compelling realism.
Immediately evoking a powerful sense of place, the first episode opens with views of buildings, vegetation and trees filmed in what seems to be springtime from a vehicle driving on a road as children sing on the soundtrack. The sound of gunfire heralds a cut to the wintry murder scene, followed by glimpses of the funeral service for the victims, the anguished killer in a cell, and his wife and four children silent together at home. And then the film returns to a warmer season, with Pasi again a figure in a landscape holding a gun, but on a day when he shot a bird from a tall tree.
Mikko Niskanen and Paavo Pentikäinen
PHOTO: JANUS FILMS
Guns and alcohol are woven into the plot from the start. Pasi has been sneaking off to make moonshine with Reiska, telling his wife he is going hunting. As the seasons change and he and Vaimo struggle to provide for their family, he returns to drink for camaraderie and fleeting escape. Sometimes trying to outwit authorities seems like a boyishly defiant game, but he can’t elude arrests, fines, unpaid taxes and his own darker impulses.
Alcohol is a release from the sadness of underemployment, but also a family legacy, as Pasi’s father used to drink to excess. “You should stop the moonshining. Nothing good comes out of it,” Vaimo says to him in a moonlit scene in the first episode, when he has come home late. “Yes, I should move on to cognac,” he replies. Over time, his health suffers and marital strife becomes more disastrous. And yet there are moments of tenderness and humor, such as when the family celebrates Christmas by a tree glowing with candles and one of the boys plays Santa.
Scenes showing characters engaging in physical labor are as beautifully filmed as those in which men make and enjoy moonshine. Whether Pasi is energetically working the land or tackling odd jobs in harsh weather, such as logging or digging trenches for sewers, the camera takes in the grueling work and natural landscape like an intensely curious observer.
Tarja-Tuulikki Tarsala
PHOTO: JANUS FILMS
Niskanen’s writing and direction yielded a riveting story. His immersion into the part of Pasi—a character both ordinary and full of contradictions—makes it unforgettable. In Pasi’s most agonizing moments, such as after he drunkenly frightens his family, his face is a haunted mask. Near the end, his features keep slackening, he seems to terrifyingly fold into himself and his behavior is beyond easy explanation.
Playing the part took a physical toll. In a piece on “Eight Deadly Shots” for Film Comment magazine in 2012, the Finnish filmmaker and film historian Peter von Bagh, who made a documentary about Niskanen, wrote that the series was “wrought through friction and adversity, and it’s difficult to see it as anything but savagely independent filmmaking.”
In the second episode, Pasi, Vaimo and their children attend a wedding, an outing they prepare for with poignant anticipation, though Pasi will get drunk again. At this ostensibly hopeful gathering, glances exchanged in the crowd reflect social hierarchies and tensions. As the newlyweds waltz before a sea of faces, the bride reminds the groom that they have to dance, as if they could be Pasi and Vaimo’s younger selves. Out of many such small details, Niskanen built a devastating saga.
Ms. Jones writes about film and culture for the Journal.
The network is devoting the entire month to its sister studio, which turned 100 this year.
Warner Bros. will be top of the world on TCM in April when the network devotes the entire month to films and more from the studio that is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year, it was announced Wednesday.
TCM will shower viewers with scores of Warners movies, from every decade of its sister studio’s history, plus interstitials, documentaries, trailers, archival interviews, shorts and Looney Tunes cartoons.
“Warner Bros.’ history is TCM history. Where would this network be without films like Casablanca, The Maltese Falcon or A Star Is Born? We are thrilled to be honoring the studio that has given us so many iconic films since 1923,” Pola Changnon, general manager of TCM, said in a statement.
The network also will debut the restorations/remasters of 10 iconic Warner Bros. films — complete with introductions from filmmakers and film experts — as part of its multiyear partnership with The Film Foundation.
The titles are East of Eden (1955), introduced by Wes Anderson and Joanna Hogg; Storm Warning (1951), Land of the Pharaohs (1955) and Rio Bravo (1959), introduced by Martin Scorsese; Rachel, Rachel (1968), introduced by Ethan Hawke; Safe in Hell (1931), introduced by Alexander Payne; The Strawberry Blonde (1941), introduced by Anderson; A Lion Is in the Streets (1953), introduced by Daphne Dentz and Robyn Sklaren from the Warner Bros. Discovery Library; One Way Passage (1932); and Helen of Troy (1956).
Joanne Woodward (left) and Kate Harrington in 1968’s ‘Rachel, Rachel’ COURTESY EVERETT COLLECTION
Several of these also will be available for streaming in the Classics Curated by TCM hub on HBO Max.
Programming will be organized thematically to showcase the breadth of the 100-year-old studio’s films from classic to current, with categories including “Studio Contract Players,” “Warner Joins a Gang,” “Warner Goes to School,” “Warner Finds Religion,” “Warner Turns to Crime” and more.
TCM premieres will include such features as Full Metal Jacket (1987), Million Dollar Baby (2004) and Argo (2012), such documentaries as Jack L. Warner: The Last Mogul (1993) and such TCM Originals as Jet Jockeys in Love: The Making of Chain Lightning.
A big feature of the TCM Classic Film Festival is providing world premieres of major restorations of some of those classics. This year’s 14th annual fest is no different as Turner Classic Movies has announced its opening night, April 13, will feature the premiere of a 4K restoration of Howard Hawks’ 1959 Western Rio Bravo, in partnership with Martin Scorsese’s Film Foundation, as part of the yearlong celebration of Warner Bros’ 100th anniversary.
The movie, more celebrated now than ever 63 years after its initial release, stars John Wayne, Dean Martin, Ricky Nelson and Angie Dickinson, the latter the pic’s only surviving major star. She is scheduled to join TCM host Ben Mankiewicz for an onstage conversation before the screening at the TCL Chinese Theatre Imax.
Warner Bros’ logo, circa 1948Warner Bros./Everett Collection
In addition, Film Foundation board members Steven Spielberg and Paul Thomas Anderson will take the stage to celebrate the continuation of Warner Bros Discovery’s multiyear partnership with the organization, which has restored or preserved more than 950 films to ensure their survival for future generations.
The 2023 TCM Classic Film Festival, set for April 13-16 in the heart of Hollywood, will center on the theme “You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet,” celebrating film legacies, in particular the enduring legacy of Warner Bros; the studio marks its 100th anniversary on April 4. In conjunction with Warner Bros. Discovery’s centennial WB100 campaign “Celebrating Every Story,” the festival — which is very much a part of the corporate family here — will shine a spotlight on some of the studio’s landmark creations including this restoration of Rio Bravo.
“Any movie with Angie Dickinson is made better by the fact that Angie Dickinson is in it,” Mankiewicz said. “Certainly, Rio Bravo is no exception. As an added bonus, it also has a couple of guys named John Wayne and Dean Martin. Moreover, to have Paul Thomas Anderson and Steven Spielberg back for a second year in a row is such an honor, as well as an indication of the vital role TCM plays among the filmmaking community. This restoration is important not just for the film or for the 100th anniversary of Warner Bros, but for the film-loving community at large.”
Angie Dickinson in ‘Rio Bravo’Everettt
Rio Bravo, which I think never really was appreciated the way it should have been in 1959 — completely ignored by the Oscars among other critical benchmarks — stars Wayne as a sheriff with an unlikely group of allies including Martin, Nelson and Dickinson along with a host of great character actors and Western staples, as they help defend against a gang of armed attackers intent on breaking out a prisoner. Richly filmed in Technicolor, Rio Bravo was deemed “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” by the Library of Congress in 2014 and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry. It now often makes the lists of all-time favorite movies.
TCM previously said that Oscar-winning production designer Patrizia von Brandenstein and actor-dancer-choreographer-director-artist Russ Tamblyn will be honored with tributes at this year’s festival. The fourth annual Robert Osborne Award, recognizing an individual who has helped keep the cultural heritage of classic film alive for future generations, will be presented to film historian Donald Bogle.
Directors Steven Spielberg and P.T. Anderson with The Film Foundation to Celebrate 100th Anniversary of Warner Bros.
The 14th Annual TCM Classic Film Festival Opens in Hollywood April 13
Turner Classic Movies (TCM) will kick off the 14th annual TCM Classic Film Festival on Thursday, April 13 with theclassic westernRio Bravo (1959) with star Angie Dickinson in attendance to have a conversation with TCM Host Ben Mankiewicz ahead of the film. The screening will be a world premiere of a 4k restoration of the film, in partnership with The Film Foundation, as part of the year-long celebration of Warner Bros.’ 100th anniversary. In addition, Film Foundation board members Steven Spielberg and Paul Thomas Anderson will take the stage to celebrate the continuation of Warner Bros. Discovery’s multi-year partnership with Martin Scorsese’s The Film Foundation, which has restored or preserved more than 950 of films ensuring their survival for future generations.
The 2023 TCM Classic Film Festival, held in the heart of Hollywood April 13-16, will center around the theme “You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet,” celebrating film legacies, in particular the enduring legacy of Warner Bros., which marks its 100th anniversary on April 4, 2023. In conjunction with Warner Bros. Discovery’s centennial WB100 campaign, Celebrating Every Story, the TCM Classic Film Festival will shine a spotlight on some of the studio’s landmark creations, including this restoration of Rio Bravo.
"Any movie with Angie Dickinson is made better by the fact that Angie Dickinson is in it. Certainly, Rio Bravo is no exception. As an added bonus, it also has a couple of guys named John Wayne and Dean Martin. Moreover, to have Paul Thomas Anderson and Steven Spielberg back for a second year in a row is such an honor, as well as an indication of the vital role TCM plays among the filmmaking community,” said Ben Mankiewicz, TCM Primetime Anchor and Official Host of the TCM Classic Film Festival. “This restoration is important not just for the film or for the 100th anniversary of Warner Bros., but for the film-loving community at large.”
This hit western from Warner Bros. stars John Wayne as a sheriff with an unlikely group of allies, including Dean Martin, Ricky Nelson, and Angie Dickinson, as they help defend against a gang of armed attackers intent on breaking out a prisoner. Richly filmed in Technicolor, this landmark film looks better than ever in a world premiere 4k restoration. In 2014, Rio Bravo was deemed “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.
TCM has previously announced Academy Award®-winning production designer Patrizia von Brandenstein and actor, dancer, choreographer, director, and artist Russ Tamblyn will be honored as Tributes at this year’s Festival. In addition, the fourth annual Robert Osborne Award, recognizing an individual who has helped keep the cultural heritage of classic film alive for future generations, will be presented to film historian Donald Bogle.
