TUNTEMATON SOTILAS / THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER (2017)

Third film adaptation of Väinö Linna's classic WWII war novel, from Aku Louhimies, came out in three sizes: an international release of 2+ hours; a three-hour version for the home market; and extended tv mini-series at five. Kino-Lorber’s DVD opts for the three hour cut, which feels about right; easy to follow/compelling all the way. A traditional war platoon saga, it’s solid filmmaking, old-fashioned in a good way, with well-drawn, identifiable subsets of soldiers & officers taking us over the four year period (1941 - 1944) of Finland’s doomed fight to regain territory lost to Russia in the ‘Winter War’ of 1939.* For American audiences, it’s probably a shock to see that Finland aligned with Hitler’s German, and with no mention that British/American aid had first been refused. But the political backstory is downplayed for straightforward Men-At-War dramatics. Nothing you won’t recognize, but extremely good on those terms. With fully etched portraits of four or five leading players to chart the ebb and flow of battles & retreats. Technically, very well handled, with convincing effects wed to superb character acting. Seen at its best in the quiet heroics of a thrillingly well-constructed sequence where an indomitable older soldier, a take-no-crap-from-superiors type, finds a perfect natural redoubt hidden by snowfall, where he can believably take down an entire Russian battle unit moving below his position.

DOUBLE-BILL: Though very different in feeling & intent, Samuel Fuller’s flawed, but affecting THE BIG RED ONE/’80 comes to mind.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: *Finland’s 1939 loss to Russia in the Winter War got the prestige B’way treatment in Robert Sherwood’s THERE SHALL BE NO NIGHT: The Lunts, young Montgomery Clift, fat Sydney Greenstreet, and a multi-tasking Richard Whorf (actor & scenic designer), only to have Sherwood move the play’s location from Finland to Hungary post Nazi alignment!

READ ALL ABOUT IT: More great Finnish WWII movie material from this troubling period in William Trotter’s WINTER FIRE, told from the perspective of a reluctant Nazi intelligence officer stationed near the estate of composer Jean Sibelius. The mixture of war action & a blocked composer trying to ignore world events shouldn’t work, but does.