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First image released from film, which shot in Finland and will shoot in China in October.

The Yellow Affair has boarded international sales for Mika Kaurismaki’s new film Master Cheng, and will discuss the film with buyers in Toronto.

Kaurismaki has wrapped the Finnish portion of the shoot for Master Cheng, which he also produces for his own Marianna Films. The co-production companies are Huang Yaqui’s QianJi Culture Co. Ltd (China) and Iain Brown’s By Media (China/UK).

The film shot July 16 to Aug 23 in Finnish Lapland, including Raattama, Kittilä, Muonio, Ylläs and Sodankylä. In October, it...

Chicago – What is amazing about the texture of this 1992 film version of the 1848 Henri Murger novel, “La Vie de Bohéme,” is that it looks like it could have been filmed during the French New Wave period of the late 1950s/early ‘60s. The Criterion Collection offers a stunning new Blu-ray transfer of a now classic adaptation.

Rating: 4.5/5.0

Directed by Aki Kaurismäki (“Le Havre”), a Finnish filmmaker, but co-produced by France, Italy and Sweden as well, this version of “La Vie de Bohéme” – there have been over a dozen versions, including the opera “La Bohéme” and the Broadway musical “Rent” – has an international cast and beguiling black & white cinematography by Timo Salminen. It plays like a verité documentary, as all of the performers have such a naturalistic virtue in their portrayals. They are desperate but free, and even a woman searching for love cannot resist their slovenly grace. Each ne’er...

I wish there was some clever The Matrix or Zardoz-like way to learn languages because I tell you, it’s a bit of a pain not being able to understand what people are saying. Thankfully, the power of cinema is that it can transcend language and the images can often be just as powerful without words. Such is the case of Kari Väänänen’s Backwood Philosopher (“Havukka-ahon ajattelija”).

Based on a novel by Finnish novelist Veikko Huovinen, it’s the story of two biologists and an uneducated but smart lumberjack who set out on a journey through the remote backwoods of eastern Finland where they explore and learn new things about science, history and human nature.

It sounds like an interesting enough story but what captured me was the gorgeous look of the film which partly reminds me of a nature special with its gorgeously lush images of nature while...