12/06/2014 - The Finnish Film Foundation is supporting four new features, including the sequel to the 2010 romantic comedy

Janne and Inari – the Finn from Lapland who made a career out of living off welfare benefits, and his girlfriend who wanted him to get a grip on life – were last seen in Finnish director Dome Karukoski’s romantic comedy Lapland Odyssey [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (2010). Now they are set to return in the sequel, also written by Pekko Pesonen.

They have now got a two-year-old daughter, whom Janne leaves in the car on a night out with friends – and the car gets stolen. This time directed by Teppo Airaksinen, and produced by Jarkko Hentula for Yellow Film & TV, Lapland Odyssey II – which will be launched by Nordisk Film Finland in autumn 2015 – is one of four new features that the Finnish Film Foundation has backed by €2.3 million.

Finnish actress-director-writer Marjut Komulainen will direct We Are the Pirates of the Roads [+see also:
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film profile], described as “a crazy road movie for children”, from Siri Kolu’s book, which received the Finlandia Junior Prize in 2010. Claes Olsson will produce for Kinoproduction, with Germany’s Ulysses and Sweden’s Bright Moving Pictures, and Nordisk Film Finland will release the title.

Off Key [+see also:
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film profile] follows a 35-year-old engineer who agrees to drive his recently widowed mother to a karaoke competition, hoping he can talk her out of it. Scripted by Johanna Hartikainen, his efforts will be directed by Finnish filmmaker Lauri Nurkse and produced by Ella Piesala for FremantleMedia Finland. Nordisk Film Finland will distribute.

The ingredients in Blue Hotel 965 are a “foreign city, a man and a woman, one hotel room, two nights, and no common language”. These will be blended together by Finnish director Mikko Kuparinen, who also wrote the script for the Mjölk Movies production, with the involvement of Artbox and Channel Four Finland. Atlantic will release the film in autumn 2015.

The foundation also contributed €0.3 million to two minority co-productions: Margus Paju’s Secret Society of Souptown [+see also:
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film profile], from Estonia’s Nafta Films with Finland’s Solar Films; and Alexandra-Therese Keining’s The Boys, from Sweden’s GötaFilm with Finland’s Periferia Productions.