The Year of the Hare

Jäniksen Vuosi

Finland

1977

129 Min

Color

English, Finnish

Currently 4.1/5 Stars.
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SCR Arto Paasilinna, Kullervo Kukkasjärvi

DP Juha-Veli Äkräs, Antti Peippo, Erkki Peltomaa

CAST Antti Litja, Kauko Helovirta, Markku Huhtamo, Paavo Hukkinen, Juha Kandolin, Kosti Klemelä, Anna-Maija Kokkinen, Martti Kuningas, Ahti Kuoppala, Hannele Lanu, Hannu Lauri, Heikki Nousiainen, Esa Pakarinen, Martti Pennanen, Tuija Piepponen, Eija Pokkinen, Rita Polster, Elis Sella, Jukka Sipilä, Arto Tuominen, Aapo Vilhunen, Georges Copeloussis, Masaaki Hashimoto, Rostislav Holthoer, Henrik Jankes, Leni Katajakoski, Pekka Litja, Marja Mykkänen, Helena Notkonen, Eija Nousiainen, Antti Peippo, Lia Petersen, Jorma Pulkkinen, Riku Rinkama, Eero Rinne, Pertti Sarkio, Markku Söderström, Orvokki Taivalsaari, Irma Wafin, Jussi Aalto, Maarit Rinne, Juha Rosma, Richard Tenholinna

ED Risto Jarva, Matti Kuortti, Tuula Mehtonen

SOUND Tuomo Kattilakoski, Matti Kuortti, Timo Linnasalo

Synopsis

Young advertising executive Vatanen suddenly quits his job and his whole life in Helsinki, and decides to spend a while in the Finnish wilderness. A wounded hare hit by a car becomes his travel companion. Together they find reclusion in the Finnish Lapland, soon to be disturbed by a noisy group of foreign tourists and their pretentious Finnish hosts. When the hare gets ill and needs to see a vet, Vatanen must return to the city and finally face the choice between his new and former life. –IMDb

Director

Risto Jarva

Risto Antero Jarva (15 July 1934 – 16 December 1977) was a Finnish filmmaker.

His last film was Jäniksen vuosi (“The Year of the Hare”). He died in a car accident on his way back from a private showing of the film, and the subsequent party.

Mr. Jarva usually approached his long films and short documentary films from some social problem and from one or more possible ways to solve it. Such problems included the widespread use of cars, the position of women, city planning, pollution, the role of gossip magazines’ journalists, and the Finnish society’s remaining ideological divides.

Jarva worked as an artistic professor of the film from 1970 to 1975 and as the Helsinki Applied Arts and Industry College’s senior teacher from 1975 to 1977. —Wikipedia