
Acting
Esko Nikkari
Born 1938-11-23 · Lapua, Finland
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Esko Nikkari (23 November 1938 Lapua, Finland – 17 December 2006 in Seinäjoki, Finland) was a prolific Finnish actor who made more than 70 appearances on film and television. He debuted in 1974 in the movie Karvat. Nikkari was a workhorse of the Kaurismäki brothers, with whom he first worked on Rikos ja rangaistus in 1983. His last role with Aki Kaurismäki was in Man without a Past in 2002. He starred in the 1994 film Aapo opposite actors such as Taisto Reimaluoto, Ulla Koivuranta and Kai Lehtinen. More recently, he has appeared in a number of Timo Koivusalo films such as Kaksipäisen kotkan varjossa (2005), which is the last full-length movie he appeared in. Description above from the Wikipedia article Esko Nikkari, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Acting credits
7.4Arriving in Helsinki, a nameless man is beaten within an inch of his life by thugs, miraculously recovering only to find that he has completely lost his memory. Back on the streets, he attempts to begin again from zero, befriending a moody dog and becoming besotted with a Salvation Army volunteer.
The Man Without a Past
2002
7.4Iris is a shy and dowdy young woman stuck in a dead-end job at a match factory, who dreams of finding love at the local dancehall. Finding herself pregnant after a one-night stand and abandoned by the father, Iris finally decides the time has come to get even and she begins to plot her revenge.
The Match Factory Girl
1990
5.1Irma Auer (Satu Silvo) is a former call-girl, trying to distance herself from the past. In a séance she is told to be 'marked for death', and is afterward threatened by her former pimp and abandoned by her groom, as he learns about her past. Irma attempts to commit suicide, and resurrects at the city morgue after being pronounced dead. After the incident, she wanders out direction-less, being pursued by the doctor who treated her and also a strange, tall man.
Marked
1984
7.1A Finnish man goes to the city to find a job after the mine where he worked is closed and his father commits suicide.
Ariel
1988
6.8Kuningasjätkä is set in North Karelia in the mid-1950s and depicts the summer of 10-year-old Topi at the boating site with his widowed father Tenho.
A Summer by the River
1998
6.4Manne, Harri, and Ville Alfa are rootless twenty-somethings in search of purpose for their banal lives. After Manne steals a priceless painting from a group of petty criminals, Manne and Harri flee from the gangsters across Finland, while Ville goes to Paris. On the road they meet Veera, an old girlfriend of Harri's, and try to avoid the gangsters in pursuit.
The Worthless
1982
7.3Nikander, a rubbish collector and would-be entrepreneur, finds his plans for success dashed when his business associate dies. One evening, he meets Ilona, a down-on-her-luck cashier, in a local supermarket. Falteringly, a bond begins to develop between them.
Shadows in Paradise
1986
6.9After Nazi Germany invades Poland in September 1939, Russia attacks Finland two months later. Finnish reservists leave home and go to war. Brothers Martti and Paavo Hakala, farmers from the municipality of Kauhava in the province of Pohjanmaa/Ostrobothnia, serve in a Finnish platoon.
The Winter War
1989
6.1Pekka arrives back to his home village of Jerusalem to celebrate the last wedding of the village. His own marriage seems to have reached a dead end. The people of the village gather to prepare for the event, and the bitter spectrum of all human life, with its joys and sorrows, is condensed into one summer's day.
The Last Wedding
1995
No synopsis available yet.
Karavaani
1992
4.3In a comedy set in Rovaniemi, the parish’s housekeeper Kristiina Pahka falls in love with Marsipaani Räikkonen, even though he knows that the man is a petty criminal. Under the leadership of hard-hitting Inspector Rautapää, the city’s police force will have to investigate many kinds of crimes, of which Marsipaani’s close friends know one or another.
Rikos & rakkaus
1999
6.4Ilona, a young teacher, arrives in a village in Tavastia. She and Aarne, the wealthy owner of the Niskavuori farm, who is frustrated with his marriage, fall in love. The relationship becomes a public secret. Aarne's wife Martta, who owns half of Niskavuori, wants to hold on to her husband until the last. For Loviisa, the matriarch of Niskavuori, the most important thing is the reputation and honor of the family.
Niskavuori
1984
7.6The ever-poker-faced Ilona loses her job as a restaurant hostess, as her tram driver husband, Lauri, also finds himself out of work. Together they must hit the streets of Helsinki, facing up to hardship and humiliation in their quest for survival, guided through the gloom by a ray of hope.
Drifting Clouds
1996
7.0A lawyer pays a visit to Matti Ojanperä, a bum living under a bridge in the Helsinki harbour, to inform him that he is about to inherit an American aunt of his. The sum 1,000,000 Fmk would be his, if only he meets the qualifications set by his aunt. He must show that he is capable of 'living properly' and possessing a 'respectable occupation and a family he can support'. Otherwise the money would go to a foundation the chairman of which the lawyer himself happens to be!
Cha Cha Cha
1989
7.0A hospital room drama in which women talk about love, children, relationships with men, and life in general. Stories of survival are seasoned with both tears and laughter.
Lumikit
1986
6.4The life of Irwin Goodman, a Finnish singer.
The Rose of the Rascal
2001
5.6A film group is making movie in the little town. Writer Pentti Töysä interrupts film group's press conference and claims that script is written by him and it is based on true story. Töysä also says that he has written a new ending to the movie and that it reveals an old murder. Not everyone is happy about the new twist.
Kaikki pelissä
1994
5.9An ageing wrestler and circus strongman is put in an institution located somewhere in a world of its own.
The Wrestler
1985
1.0Mean girls bully Anna-Maija after she is seen kissing a boy. Her parents notice that the girl's affairs are not in order, but they did not know the reason for their melancholy. Mother buys eight mirrors, one for each member of the family.
Eight Mirrors
1982
No synopsis available yet.
Dildo
1989
9.0Aspiring young comedian Hepi rides a moped and sleeps in cars left at a garage for repair. He joins a group of older but equally bad comedians trying to capture and sell their art on videotape. Hepi charms a girl working in the Zoological Museum with his imitations of bird sounds. Alienated look at the frustrations of show business, as presented by a cast of popular Finnish TV comedians with their absurd dialogue and eccentric inside jokes.
Koomikko
1983
5.5A political drama set in the fictional country of Illyria between 1943 and 1945, the story is about the assassination of a leading politician. The country, an ally of Nazi Germany, is on the verge of being annexed to the Eastern Bloc. Kaurismäki's TV adaptation of Jean-Paul Sartre's play Les Mains Sales (Dirty Hands) tells the story of Hugo (Matti Pellonpää) who has just been released from prison. Before going to prison, he has worked as a journalist at his party's newspaper. This timid journalist, who uses the pseudonym Raskolnikov, wants to advance in his career and gets his chance when Hoederer (Sulevi Peltola), the leader of the party, has to be eliminated.
Dirty Hands
2015
5.7Finland 1917. Aapo is a single peasantry who tries to live a good life before the finnish civil war begins.
Aapo
1994
6.4Pentti Anttila is a journalist, who accidentally ends up in to a mental institution. There he meets a woman, who claims that she is being kept there by force. Penttilä starts to investigate the case and he ends up in to a little town named Järvensuu. There he drifts in to a conflict with the local mob.
Tie naisen sydämeen
1996