Pekka Strang, Jari Virman board new genre-bending It’s Alive trip

Scandinavian Film Distribution has picked up Scandinavian rights.

The Player (Peluri), the latest project from the prolific and trailblazing filmmaking duo-producer Jani Pösö and writer/director Teemu Nikki (It’s Alive Films), was one of the stand-out works in progress at this week’s New Nordic Films in Haugesund.

Pösö was back on stage in Haugesund where their previous ground-breaking film, the Nordic Council Film Prize nominated The Blind Man Who Didn’t Want to See Titanic, won its first major accolade - the Eurimages Lab Development Award in 2020.

In line with It’s Alive Films’ trademark which is to deliver ‘projects about ‘deadly-serious’ subjects, in an entertaining and innovative way, The Player, deals with addiction - and most specifically gambling.

The two main characters are Risto Kivi, a man without a heart and his friend Arto Niska, a man without a brain, or 15% only functioning properly. They have lost everything to gambling and live in a hearse, working as undertakers. We follow them as they are rapidly getting into a downward spiral and in desperate need for a fresh start. Everything has gone wrong for the duo. Ultimately, they are forced to gamble with their own lives.

“When you’ve lost everything and you need money, you can always choose between your life and money! quips Pösö, who describes the film as “a “genre-bending It’s Alive trip, that will both entertain and shock the audience, helping them understand life’s absurdities”.

For the starring roles, Nikki is reunited with Pekka Strang (Canneseries laureate for the series Mister8) and Jari Virman (Euthanizer, Mister8) who took an active part in the creative process from an early stage. “Usually, we don’t have time to rehearse, we’re not in Hollywood!” But here, we were able to involve the actors who gave their input during scriptwriting,” Pösö told nordicfilmandtvnews.com.

Filming is still underway, and the delivery is set for April 2023.

So far The Player has received support from Yle, the Finnish Film Foundation, and is being co-produced by Italy’s Andrea Romeo, managing director of the quality arthouse distribution outfit I Wonder Pictures, who set up shop a decade ago with Joshua Oppenheimer’s The Act of Killing. “Andrea has been distributing all our films in Italy since Euthanizer,” Pösö said.

The project is open for international sales.

Parallel to The Player, Pösö and Niki are finalising their first family film- Snot & Splash, to be pitched at the upcoming Finnish Film Affair in Helsinki (September 21-23). The stellar Finnish cast takes in Pekka Strang -as a dentist-, Kati Outinen, Sampo Sarkomaa, Petteri Pennilä and Elina Knihtilä. (See our separate story; CLICK HERE.) Scanbox handles distribution.