{"id":5074,"date":"2013-08-02T22:11:08","date_gmt":"2013-08-03T02:11:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=5074"},"modified":"2018-08-03T14:53:49","modified_gmt":"2018-08-03T18:53:49","slug":"tulio-1938-the-song-of-the-scarlet-flower-laulu-tulipunaisesta-kukasta","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=5074","title":{"rendered":"(Tulio 1938) The Song of the Scarlet Flower [Laulu tulipunaisesta kukasta]"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"13-08-02<\/a>

The Song of the Scar\u00adlet Flower<\/p><\/div>\n

Before the process was mech\u00ada\u00adnized, the logs tak\u00aden from the great forests of north\u00adeast\u00adern North Amer\u00adi\u00adca were cut in win\u00adter, then dragged by horse teams to the shores of rivers. This method is still used in Nova Sco\u00adtia to safe\u00adguard some envi\u00adron\u00admen\u00adtal\u00adly sen\u00adsi\u00adtive forests, since it is far less destruc\u00adtive and more sus\u00adtain\u00adable than clear-cut\u00adting. When the spring thaw came, the logs were dri\u00adven down the rivers in great mass\u00ades. Left to them\u00adselves, the logs would jam, and mil\u00adlions of board feet of lum\u00adber could back up for miles. So the logs had to be care\u00adful\u00adly herd\u00aded down the rivers, like cat\u00adtle. That\u2019s why pro\u00adfes\u00adsion\u00adal log dri\u00advers<\/em> were need\u00aded. No cow\u00adboy ever worked a job as dif\u00adfi\u00adcult and dan\u00adger\u00adous as the log dri\u00adver. He danced across the float\u00ading logs on foot, bal\u00adanc\u00ading him\u00adself with his pike pole, skip\u00adping from bateau to rolling log, to rock, to log jam, like a bal\u00adlet dancer. The job required a sort of instinc\u00adtive grasp of physics, mag\u00adi\u00adcal dex\u00adter\u00adi\u00adty, and super\u00adhu\u00adman strength. The log dri\u00adver is a stan\u00addard char\u00adac\u00adter in Cana\u00addi\u00adan folk\u00adlore, cel\u00ade\u00adbrat\u00aded in murals, cur\u00adren\u00adcy, stamps, and in the clas\u00adsic folk\u00adsong The Log Dri\u00adver\u2019s Waltz<\/em><\/span><\/a><\/span> (because of his nim\u00adble foot\u00adwork, \u201ca log dri\u00adver\u2019s waltz pleas\u00ades girls com\u00adplete\u00adly\u201d). The French-Irish-Ojib\u00adway Cana\u00addi\u00adans who dom\u00adi\u00adnat\u00aded this pro\u00adfes\u00adsion faced lit\u00adtle com\u00adpe\u00adti\u00adtion from any\u00adone else. Not sur\u00adpris\u00ading\u00adly, the key tech\u00adni\u00adcal terms of the trade were either French or Ojib\u00adway (e.g. \u201cwan\u00adni\u00adgan\u201d, the float\u00ading sup\u00adply shack on a tim\u00adber raft, from Ojib\u00adway wan\u00adnikan<\/em> orig\u00adi\u00adnal\u00adly mean\u00ading \u201cstor\u00adage pit\u201d). But one group of immi\u00adgrants to Cana\u00adda did make their mark in this pro\u00adfes\u00adsion: the Finns. The Finns in North-west\u00adern Ontario were not just bush lum\u00adber\u00adjacks. They boast\u00aded log dri\u00advers as skill\u00adful as their old\u00ader Cana\u00addi\u00adan rivals on the Sague\u00adnay and Ottawa drives.<\/span><\/p>\n

Which brings me, in a round\u00adabout way, to this film. The rea\u00adson that Finns could be com\u00adpet\u00adi\u00adtive log dri\u00advers in Cana\u00adda is that the iden\u00adti\u00adcal pro\u00adfes\u00adsion exist\u00aded in Fin\u00adland*, and it is the sub\u00adject of the old\u00adest Finnish motion pic\u00adture in my film col\u00adlec\u00adtion, Laulu tulipunais\u00ades\u00adta kukas\u00adta<\/em> (1938) [\u201cThe Song of the Scar\u00adlet Flower\u201d]. It is not a cin\u00ade\u00admat\u00adic mas\u00adter\u00adpiece. The act\u00ading is melo\u00addra\u00admat\u00adic, the cut\u00adting some\u00adtimes awk\u00adward, and much of it feels more like a silent film of twen\u00adty years before. But it\u2019s direc\u00adtor, Teu\u00advo Tulio, had great tal\u00adent. The film\u2019s enthu\u00adsi\u00adasm and sin\u00adcer\u00adi\u00adty make up for what it lacks in sophis\u00adti\u00adca\u00adtion. The sto\u00adry is based on a nov\u00adel by Johannes Lin\u00adnankos\u00adki, and fol\u00adlows the life of a young man who skips from girl to girl as eas\u00adi\u00adly as he skips from log to log, until his sin\u00adful\u00adness catch\u00ades up to him and forces him into spir\u00adi\u00adtu\u00adal redemp\u00adtion. All very pietist. A French Cana\u00addi\u00adan ver\u00adsion of this sto\u00adry would\u00adn\u2019t both\u00ader with the redemp\u00adtion part, or for that mat\u00adter see where there was any \u201csin\u201d to redeem. I haven\u2019t read the nov\u00adel, so I don\u2019t know if it is a faith\u00adful adap\u00adta\u00adtion, or what ele\u00adments are Tulio\u2019s rather than Lin\u00adnankoski\u2019s. The book had already been filmed twice in a 1919 silent ver\u00adsion, and in Swedish by Per-Axel Bran\u00adner in 1934. It would be remade yet again in 1956. I don\u2019t think any of these ver\u00adsions found an audi\u00adence out\u00adside of Fin\u00adland and Scandinavia. <\/span>\"13-08-02<\/a><\/p>\n

As always with old films, I watch part\u00adly just to see visu\u00adal details of the past and oth\u00ader places. The film gives no hint of the dev\u00adas\u00adtat\u00ading war that Fin\u00adland would have thrust upon it only a year after its release. The coun\u00adtry peo\u00adple play a rather strange ver\u00adsion of the game of \u201ctag\u201d. The inte\u00adri\u00adors of the squared log hous\u00ades are spar\u00adtan, but nev\u00ader\u00adthe\u00adless already dis\u00adplay the Finnish knack for flu\u00adid design. The kitchens look par\u00adtic\u00adu\u00adlar\u00adly nice. And, in a wild riv\u00ader land\u00adscape indis\u00adtin\u00adguish\u00adable from fron\u00adtier Que\u00adbec or Ontario, the log dri\u00adve flows under one of those super-mod\u00adern bridges that Finns were build\u00ading in the 1930\u2019s. The effect is dis\u00adcon\u00adcert\u00ading, as if some\u00adone had crude\u00adly pho\u00adto-shopped the film with a mod\u00adern snap.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

The love scenes are far more sen\u00adsu\u00adous than any\u00adthing that would have been per\u00admit\u00adted in Amer\u00adi\u00adcan cin\u00ade\u00adma in 1938. There is an absolute\u00adly delight\u00adful nude scene. But the best parts of the film are the log dri\u00adving scenes, which are both gen\u00aduine\u00adly excit\u00ading and tech\u00adni\u00adcal\u00adly accurate. <\/span>
\u2014\u2014\u2014
\u2014 - \u2014 *search\u00ading for infor\u00adma\u00adtion on the sub\u00adject, I came across this quote from Finnish film-mak\u00ader Markku Var\u00adjo\u00adla: \u201cIn the Finnish con\u00adscious\u00adness the log\u00adger occu\u00adpies the role of the cow\u00adboy from the Amer\u00adi\u00adcan her\u00aditage. He has rep\u00adre\u00adsent\u00aded adven\u00adture, free\u00addom and inde\u00adpen\u00addence, con\u00adstant\u00adly mov\u00ading true man, a van\u00adish\u00ading breed.\u201d, a sen\u00adti\u00adment that could just as eas\u00adi\u00adly have been writ\u00adten in Canada.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Before the process was mech\u00ada\u00adnized, the logs tak\u00aden from the great forests of north\u00adeast\u00adern North Amer\u00adi\u00adca were cut in win\u00adter, then dragged by horse teams to the shores of rivers. This method is still used in Nova Sco\u00adtia to safe\u00adguard some \u2026<\/p>\n

Read more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[948,939],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-d-viewing","category-dn-viewing-2013"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5074"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5074\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7540,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5074\/revisions\/7540"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}