05/09/2007

Finnish audiences will finally be able to taste local fare on Friday after six months of famine, and the film menu is of strong substance. Claes Olsson’s Colorado Avenue [+see also:
trailer
film profile] set to open on 20 prints through Sandrew Metronome is a period piece spreading over several decades of Finland’s most turbulent historical period.

“Making this film was crucial to me because it is spread over 3-4 decades that were crucial in the history of the independence of Finland, and those years still have an echo on today’s Finland, on how people think. But history in itself is not so interesting so I wanted to focus on people and how they survived during that dramatic period”, said Olsson.

Based on best-selling novels by Lars Sund, Colorado Avenue focuses on Hanna and her family as she tries to survive against the backdrop of a country fighting for its independence from Russia and then enduring a civil war. After having made her fortune in Colorado in the US, she comes back home, single mother with two kids. Through hard work, she gains respect from her fellow citizens. Time passes. Prohibition takes effect in 1919 and her son Otto soon becomes a liquor smuggler, bringing shame upon his mother.

Produced by Olsson and his colleague Leila Lyytikäinen from Kinoproduction, Colorado Avenue had a €2.8m budget, “twice the amount of a normal Finnish film”, says the filmmaker who had to wait four years to put the financing together. The film was co-produced with Kinoproduction’s usual Swedish partner Filmlance Film International in Sweden with Nordic Film Pool Ltd. International sales are handled by Nordisk Film International Sales.