Written and directed by Selma Vilhunen, Four Little Adults will have its world premiere at the International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR). The film is also selected for their Big Screen Competition. The festival takes place Jan 25 – Feb 5 2023.

After the International Film Festival Rotterdam, Four Little Adults will travel to Göteborg Film Festival where it’s nominated for the Dragon Award – ‘Best Nordic Film.’

Four Little Adults is a touching and humane portrait of grown-ups with growing pains. Juulia is a successful Member of the Parliament with a seemingly perfect marriage with her priest husband Matias. But when Juulia discovers that Matias has had a year-long affair with Enni, she collapses. To save her marriage, Juulia invites Enni to be a part of their lives, and they start a polyamorous relationship. When Juulia explores the new rules, she falls in love with young Miska, who seems to be the most mature of the quartet. There is a lot of love in the relationships among the four, but no matter how hard they try, the challenges remain.

In the Finnish comedy series Carpe Fucking Diem! we meet two women in their thirties, Karla (Lotta Kaihua) and Miina (Ella Lahdenmäki). They move in together and write a to do-list for a gap year: form a rock band, say what you think, do drugs, don't fall in love, grow spiritually, save the world and have sex.

Carpe Fucking Diem! is written by Kirsikka Saari and Jenni Toivoniemi, directed by Kirsikka Saari and Selma Vilhunen.

Carpe Fucking Diem! will premiere April 2 on C More Finland.

Selma Vilhunen’s Stupid Young Heart will be Finland’s submission for ‘Best International Feature Film’ at the Academy awards. The celebrated film had its world premiere at the 2018 Toronto International Film Festival and won the Crystal Bear for ‘Best Youth Film’ at the 2019 Berlinale.

Stupid Young Heart tells the story of a group of teenagers grappling with the unexpected grown-up problem of pregnancy while far right ideas start to spread in their multicultural neighborhood.

The Academy award nominations in the International Feature Film category will be announced on January 13th, 2020.

2017 saw Selma Vilhunen’s documentary Hobbyhorse Revolution premiere at the Tampere Film Festival and win the Risto Jarva Main Prize in a national competition. The documentary also won the title of ‘Best Documentary’ at the 2018 Jussi Awards.

The hobbyhorse phenomenon has now reached the US. The New York Times interviews Vilhunen about the fascinating subculture, praising the way her documentary “captured its subjects in long spells of raucous joy.”

To read the article in the New York Times, click “Read more” below.

Berlin International Film Festival’s Youth Jury Generation 14plus has chosen Stupid Young Heart, directed by Selma Vilhunen, as the winner of the 2019 Crystal Bear for ‘Best Film’. The Generation 14plus jury consists of members of the same age as the intended target audience of the movies they choose between. The jury motivates their choice of Stupid Young Heart thusly:

“[Stupid Young Heart] takes up topics that are above all of great relevance for our age group. It examines motivations behind the current political shift towards the right and xenophobia in our society. With its combination of humor, seriousness and emotion, this film tells the story of a romantic relationship between two adolescents who experience little consistency in their lives. The radical coming-of-age of the protagonists is constantly overshadowed by the confrontation with racism and the search for identity.”

The Ministry of Education and Culture has awarded director Selma Vilhunen the Finnish National Prize. Vilhunen is one of eight artists and groups to receive the award, granted in acknowledgement of a significant artistic career, achievement or promising breakthrough. The prize has been awarded since 1993 and amounts to EUR 24.700.

“With this year’s National Prize we wish to honor solid artistic know-how. These artists represent long-standing competence in, and impact on, the Finnish art field,” says Minister Sampo Terho.

Acclaimed Finnish filmmaker and Oscar nominee Selma Vilhunen has rapidly gained international success with her feature films, shorts and documentaries. Her fiction feature debut Little Wing (2016) played at more than 50 festivals around the world, received wonderful reviews and was, among many prizes and nominations, awarded the Nordic Council Film Prize 2017.

Vilhunen’s most recent documentary, the praised Hobbyhorse Revolution (2017), was the winner of ‘Best Documentary’ at the 2018 Jussi Awards and her latest feature, Stupid Young Heart (2018) had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival, where it was very well received.