Klaus Härö talks about young actors

Supervisor Klaus Härön51, films are known for being sensitive, lingering and atmospheric.

However, the man himself blurts out his latest directorial at the press conference like mercury and accuses a hundred words per second.

– I am the opposite of the mood of my films, talkative and restless. Maybe I’m consciously looking for a slowdown in the midst of all the hecticness.

– Many people are even surprised when they see me, they thought I was much older! Maybe from my films you can get an idea of ​​a more serene type, Härö laughs.

A middle-aged child

Härö’s latest direction, the eighth feature film My dear sea captaintells about the love of a mature age and the relationship between a father and an adult daughter.

– In the marketing of the film, the role of Grace’s daughter has perhaps been too little. I believe that the situation of an adult child touches many middle-aged viewers. They are living their own peak years, but at the same time there should be time to help aging parents, Härö reflects.

– There are too many things to balance between. Hours and days are not enough, he continues.

The director says that he observes how people in their forties and fifties, for example, respond to their parents’ calls.

– Others joyfully exclaim that oh, mother is calling, let’s answer. Others are gritting their teeth that oh no, that guy is going to bomb again. An adult can regress into a small child in the company of his parents.

– It’s sad to watch if the relationship between a child and a parent has never found adult friendship, he continues.

Such is the broken, non-communicative relationship between Howard the sea captain in the movie and his daughter Grace.

Familiar elements

Already in Härö’s earlier films, relationships between children and parents have been discussed. In the previous two, Unknown Master and Life after deathspecifically from the point of view of an adult child.

– You can never get rid of family relationships. And it’s great wealth when relationships are in order. When you are with your parents, you are with yourself, says Härö.

The Life After Death movie was autobiographical. Härö went through his own fatherly relationship in it.

– I made that and Rakkaani sea captain partly at the same time and interestingly enough, the same elements came into them.

– Both have a somewhat difficult father, a relative who feels incompetent, and then someone from the outside who initiates communication. Although it was not intended to steal from one film to another, there were similarities.

Towards a new kind

Similarities can also be found in the latest film to Härö’s 2005 release The best of mothers -film, because both have the same screenwriters, Kirsi Vikman and Jimmy Karlsson.

– But of course we don’t make movies in the way that, since it went so well last time, let’s do it the same way again.

– In this latest one, we started to think about the story from the point of view that if Romeo and Juliet’s love story was hindered by their parents, what happens when parents fall in love and the children are an obstacle to the union. We started to build pieces from it, the director tells about the film’s creation process.

Although Härö’s films are often recognizable in their atmosphere, he says that he always starts a new project with the idea that he is doing something completely different.

– This time we had to go all the way to Ireland to make a film. I thought that in that way it would at least be new, Härö laughs.

The end result is the familiar and guaranteed Härö.

– After all, I myself could see from the finished film that okay, I just can’t get out of my spots, the director huffs.

Out of fashion

My Beloved Sea Captain was filmed entirely in Ireland, with Irish actors, a mostly Irish production crew and in English.

See you in the main roles James CosmoBrid Brennan and Catherine Walker.

Härö says that he is always looking for personable types for the roles of his films.

– Especially young actors, both in Finland and abroad, are starting to look like they are from the same fashion or sports store advertisement: polished and trimmed copies of each other.

– I can’t bear to watch, for example, Beauty and the Brave, where all the people look so similar that I confuse them! The bull exclaims.

In his role-playing, he deliberately turns associations into a new position.

– For example, James Cosmo, as a big guy, has done a lot of villain roles. Personally, I saw him more as an open embrace, a warm and loving grandfather. Cosmo fit Howard’s role wonderfully, says Härö.

Brid Brennan, on the other hand, is known as a comedian, Härö wanted her in a more dramatic role.

– It is sad that Actors are labeled as certain genres. The same actors play the same roles again and again in Finnish films.

– Of course, there is a reason why this is so. Someone, for example, is good as a comedian. But it would also be good for the actor himself to be able to play a completely different role from time to time, Härö thinks.

Through the lens

Where does the peace of the films directed by Härö come from? At least the camera loves to linger on the actors’ faces for a long time. Even the quiet moments have been carefully considered.

– Of course there has to be dialogue, but as a director, I’m always waiting for the moment when I could tell things more cinematically instead of talking. Even in life, the best moments are often those when we are silent. We don’t speak, but we understand the other’s love, support, comfort or whatever.

– You often hear it said about meaningful moments in everyday life that ‘We didn’t talk much, that was it.’ It’s a director’s celebration when you make the same thing work in a movie, Härö opens up about his method.

The director is basically always at work. Even while walking through the city, he observed his surroundings as if through the lens of a camera.

– Today, too, I was in the shopping center in the morning when the stores opened their doors. Cinematic music was playing from the speakers and I watched as a door was opened in one direction, pillows from an interior design store were being fluffed in the other, a young man was standing in the yard eating a bun with a huge flock of birds around him.

– I watched it all as if it were cutscenes from a movie, Härö reveals.

One above the others

Let’s go back to that mercurial slippery movement in Härö.

The man has been asked why he doesn’t direct a comedy or something more up-tempo, when he himself is always on the go.

– I could very well direct the action. Even blood and guts could be seen in my films if it were a war film. But no suitable scripts have been offered to be directed yet, Härö explains.

He himself watches old movies again and again. It was only recently that we got stared at Killer sharks.

But one film still stands above the rest: by Steven Spielberg ET In 1982, it made such an impression on the pre-teen Klaus that he asked his mother to be quiet while driving from the Helsinki cinema to Porvoo. The boy wanted to stay in the atmosphere of the movie.

– I still watch ET once a year, the director reveals.

My beloved sea captain, directed by Klaus Härö, premieres in Finland on September 30.