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Finnish filmmaker Juho Kuosmanen made a name for himself at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival with his second feature, Compartment No. 6, which won him the Grand Jury Prize. Having presented three films between 2009 and 2011 (Roadmarkers, Citizens and The Painting Sellers), he developed his first feature film, Olli Mäki, at the Ateliers before once again being awarded the Grand Prix of Un Certain Regard at Cannes.
Born in 1979, Juho Kuosmanen is a filmmaker, actor and editor. His films focus on gentle, often shy characters confronted with others who are their opposites. Local featherweight boxer Olli Mäki is about to take on the American Davey Moore for the world title. But he can't stand the media circus that is interfering with his future fight. This charming and witty film becomes a reflection on life choices. In Compartment No. 6, Laura, a Finnish archaeology student, embarks on a train journey from Moscow to Murmansk, beyond the Arctic Circle, to observe some famous petroglyphs (symbolic drawings carved in stone) that are ten thousand years old. On this 2000 km journey she has to live with a stranger, Ljoha, a boorish man who swears by vodka. Packed with devastating humour, these two titles have established Kuosmanen as a filmmaker who is interested in the precise and poignant destinies of modest characters. It is no coincidence that Aki Kaurismäki came to him and said: 'I've waited thirty-five years, but with you I finally have a colleague in Finnish cinema'.
Juho Kuosmanen will be present at this 37th edition of the Premiers Plans Festival with a surprise, Silent Trilogy, his latest film, which is a compilation of three short silent films made between 2012 and 2023 and not yet seen in France.
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