Sibelius Continuum / Sibelius-jatkumo

« Sibelius Continuum contemplates a vision of Finland as part of a new Europe in which language and culture have lost their meaning. But the film is an obvious fantasy: the choice of multiple spoken languages is made not for the sake of clarity, rather the opposite, in order to depict a complicated image of communication-oriented pidgin-language which reduces the richness of meaning that a common language holds. Sibelius Continuum is a film whose dialogues almost no one in our world can fully understand without reading the subtitles, subtitles that don’t quite get all the nuances, double meanings and jokes in the original context. That is to be the future for many of us when language and other aspects of culture, such as music, only exist to add a nice exotic vibe to the plain usual. The composer Jean Sibelius’ name is mentioned in the film only as a historical touch, as he is one of the few Finnish personalities known in the western world. If Sibelius gets a peace for his soul in the film, he still remains a victim of the director forever. » Aarni Vaarnamo