Sissit

Lieutenant Takala has a disease that he suffers from throughout the film. After the war, meeting up with friends turns into drinking, as is often the case in Finnish films. Yes, you can watch the movie once, but you won't be able to watch it more than once. In the rest of the world, celebrating Independence Day is celebration and joy, in Finland people are gloomy and watch war movies year after year. The biggest and must-see program on television on our Independence Day is Edwin Laine's Unknown Soldier. At some point it was replaced with a newer version and that made the people angry, downright sacrilege!

Based on a controversial best-selling novel named Sissiluutnantti by Paavo Rintala, Sissit tells a story of a mission by a Finnish army long range recon patrol operating deep behind soviet lines during world war II. All is not rosy as the battle-hardened men of the special detachment of the 20th division fight their way through the enemy lines. If you liked Peckinpah's Cross of Iron, you probably won't be disappointed after seeing this one.

Alltough plot and war is different this Finnish film can sed to be Paths of Glory of Finland. Similarly as Kubrick's Paths of Glory this film is based on best selling novel. During it's publication Paavo Rintala's novel Sissi lieutenant was controversial because how it presented Finnish women's auxiliarry force behavior. In a agrarian and conservative country it was back then a bit much. Similarly to Paths of Glory film Sissit does not glorify war but shows it's cruelty openly. Sissi is a Finnish term that does not translate to other languages easily. Same time it means querilla and recon or special troops in Finnish language. In this film sissit means a recon unit of a Finnish army infantry division somewhere in Karelia in 1943.

It's 1963. A group of men are gathered in a private room in a restaurant. As the evening wears on, toasts are drunk in honour of friends not there. Inevitably, as the memories and emotions come flooding in, the drink opens up old wounds and yet suitably numbs the senses at the same time. Drunkenness and overindulgence ensues. This same scenario is still repeated today, wherever soldier gather. WWII was a time where ordinary men and women found themselves in situations where life was fragile, killing meant survival and an act of mercy or humanity could, and sometimes did cost the lives of their comrades, let alone risk their own. The uncertainty of war undermined many peoples trust of there being a tomorrow. For many, the only choice worth making was to live life to its fullest, while it was still there to be had. This is such a story. It does not attempt to glorify, glamourise or gloss over merely in order to entertain. It is an attempt at letting the extraordinary circumstances of war tell it's own morally twisting tale. When the war finally ended and soldiers would return home to try and return to a "normal" life, normality had become a strange concept. It turned out that for many, the guilt, bitterness and horrors of war had no armistice. It is no wonder many soldiers would never speak of their experiences to even family members, let alone an outsider. There certainly wasn't the mental health and social services we enjoy today. In Finland in 1963, the only people who seemed to understand an old soldier's pain and confusion were the war comrades who would gather once a year to drink a toast or two for friends not there.

Paavo Rintala is one of the important figures in the "book wars" of Finland. Together with Hannu Salama, he managed to test the limits of the freedom of speech, and maybe also pushed the limit a bit further. When Rintala's book on the Finnish guerrilla troops in the WW2 was released, 34 retired generals protested against the publication. Also names were collected to boycott the publishing company. Attention was payed to the sexual content, but sexuality itself was of course not the reason for the rage against the book. The problem was, Rintala did not describe Finnish soldiers as highly moral, decent men, but as ordinary people losing control under the pressure. Also he described the women, working for the Lotta Svärd group (an association of volunteered women working for the army)as, good lord, sexual beings. This was very strongly against the heroic myth of military honor. And, obviously, quite realistic.

The realism might have been the reason for all the opposition faced by the movie also. Although the film praises the skills of this special force group, it also reveals the nowadays well-known fact that most, if not all, soldiers are morally corrupted by the war. The difference between the public image and the reality is very well shown in the movie.

There are two time lines in the movie. One is a post-war meeting of the survivors, being very modest in their respect for the memory of the deceased. The other time line shows us the reality of the war, with no heroes but mainly ordinary men fighting the moral battles of the war. This is a very good choice, as it emphasizes the difference between the reality and the heroic image.

This IS a war movie, though. We are shown three different operations conducted by the group. The further the movie goes, the more the brutality and degeneration of the soldiers is shown, by the means of nervous breakdown, moral corruption, excessive boozing and irresponsible behavior. The special force is also a bit of an exception exception when it comes to military discipline; as lieutenant Hakala says it "Everything is allowed for us but shooting our own." The limit between the enemy and the own, though, is not so clear sometimes.

This war movie is a quite good attempt to raise some questions of the human morale. It is also an action-filled war movie, with some limitations of resources, though. Mikko Niskanen was really a director who did dare to raise uneasy questions. This movie is important, as it questions the so-well-protected myth of Finnish soldier. But in 2005, the movie is no longer so controversial. For example, it seems obvious that many of the women working on the front had casual sex with the soldiers. So what? Everybody knew it anyway. But I think it still has to be shown, as even many of the nowadays' movies of the war can only be described as propaganda. For example, "Rukajärven tie (1999)"; in which Finnish soldiers' sexuality is described as a beautiful, romantic act between the young volunteer and her fiancée, and the sexuality of the enemy as rape. Of course one can tell a story like that, but it has no real value in the most important message a war movie can provide: In the war there is nothing to honor or celebrate.