Cinematic worlding: Animating Karelia in Santra and the Talking Trees

Abstract

<p>In the Finnish short documentary <i>Santra ja puhuvat puut</i> (<i>Santra and the Talking Trees</i>) (2013), the director Miia Tervo travels to Russian Karelia in search of her roots in the cradle of Finno-Ugrian mythology and culture. She finds rune singer Santra Remsujeva and a sense of home that she has longed for. I suggest that Tervo uses film-making as a means to ‘take root’ by connecting with the mythical world of Karelia through a playful aesthetic that engages all the senses. The documentary weaves together the director/narrator’s intimate voice-over, observational scenes, animations with traditional cultural motifs, and old ethnographic and archival footage in a process of ‘cinematic worlding’. The cinematic rhythms and animated traces of the past create a sensory experience of Karelia – a nearly extinct culture that Tervo revitalizes in an effort to find her place in the world.<br /></p>