'About Seven Brothers'
Noin 7 veljestä (Ungefär 7 bröder)
Environ sept frères (French title)
Etwa Sieben Brüder (German title)

Available on DVD

Finland 1968 B/W 96min Filmituotanto Spede Pasanen Ky

**½

Comedy

cast: Juhani Kumpulainen (von Wurstburg), Spede Pasanen (Sir Wilhelm/Robin Hood), Simo Salminen (Mauno Munalukko), Leo Jokela (Leonardo), Helge Herala (the iron glowe = Rautahanska), Kaisu Vuoristo (Helena), Krista Sihvo (Leonardo's wife), Vesa-Matti Loiri (soldier), Heikki Kuvaja (Will Scarlett = Puna-Will), Ere Kokkonen (Long John = Pitkä-Jussi), Jukka Virtanen (Tuck), Olavi Ahonen, Veikko Sinisalo, Danny (the ballad singer), Pirkko Kankaanpää (Venla)
credits: dir. Jukka Virtanen, prod. Ere Kokkonen, script Jukka Virtanen, Ere Kokkonen and Spede Pasanen, DOP Kari Sohlberg, music Jaakko Salo

Everybody knows Robin Hood and every Finn knows Aleksis Kivi's 'Seven Brothers' (a book). This film tries to be a somekind of combination of these two. It starts with Aleksis Kivi's words but soon we'll hear that the movie is actually about evil von Wurstburg and good Robin Hood. Von Wurstburg collects taxes and Robin (with his about seven brothers) robs them back from the bad guy. And of course there's also lovely ladies, for example inventor Leonardo's wife.

There's many funny jokes (like the gas-station for horses) in the movie but it has been edited (by Ossi Skurnik) so oddly that it makes the film look more like an amateur work than a real movie. But still: Spede Pasanen and his merry fellows tried to make something that nobody else wanted to try in late 60's Finland - which is great.

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