Culture visitor, actor Jorma Tommila longed for a father figure as a child. Many of his role models were war veterans. From them, he carried with him elements for the main character of the film Sisu.
The rest of his life was recovery, because there were no proper treatments. Medicines and complications tired the body. The cause of death was kidney poisoning.
In childhood, the father’s fate and past were hardly talked about, especially not to the youngest in the family, Jorma. Had to move on, survive.
– It was a really difficult place for the mother, she was left with three children. I still don’t know exactly how things went. I only got to hear about them later in life.
Heart still
Exactly sixty years after his father’s death, in January 2023, Jorma Tommila is at the peak of his acting career.
*Sisu* pays homage to the old action films of the golden era of the 1980s and 1990s. It is a shameless Nazi shooter whose personality is largely thanks to Tommila. The main character he plays, Aatami Korpi, is the perfect Finnish version of the action hero of all time: a man of principle in his sixties, whose strength comes from physical work. The body is weighed down by the burden of the past, the decades.
As a dot on the i, the hero has a superpower. It’s guts.
Tommila states that, as a person, she is in many respects carved from a different tree than the Adam Korpi in the film.
– I don’t know why I’ve started playing these tough faces, and why I’m asked for such roles. I’m a softie.
Tommila pauses to consider her next words.
– Yes, I cry. I move easily.
– I am the son raised by my mother. Black would have been different if I had had a father figure in it all along.
Tommila thinks it’s important that even though the *Sisu* movie shows Aatami Korve as a merciless killer of Nazis, you can read between the lines and between them that he has a heart in place.
– Then it’s some kind of success at work, Tommila says, her voice falling a little.
Tommila is a quiet family man
More than ten years ago, Tommila and her family settled in Vaasa, where Tommila got a job at the city theater. He knows the west coast as his home, when in Helsinki, for example, you have to \”be under the microscope all the time\”. That doesn’t suit him.
According to his own words, Tommila is quiet and unassuming by nature. The tough man of theaters and films is a kind family man in civilian life.
– Back then, men were dictators, but in our house, someone else is in charge, she laughs.
*Inside* Tommila only has one line at the end of the film. A character role, one might say, because especially in a group, Tommila doesn’t like to be loud even in civilian clothes.
– I can talk between two and three of them. But it doesn’t work in bigger groups.
One thing is not talked about
The friends founded God’s Theater, a theater group that made experimental and radical stage art according to their own definition.
In January 1987, it was a bitter twenty degrees below zero in Oulu, when the city’s residents read a special announcement in the newspaper. The students of the University of Theater told that they will present a manifesto at the Northern Theater Days seminar about *what theater can be today and what it cannot be*.
When the show on January 17 was over, the case was in all the media of the kingdom. The endurance of the audience, i.e. theater professionals, was tested by using whips, bang bombs, excrement and powder fire extinguishers in the performance.
A scandal arose, which was discussed in court and in parliament. The closure of the Theater Academy was considered.
– My friends and I agreed back then that God’s theater would only be talked about in jest. Individual interviews or comments about it are not given. This is the deal.
The self-inflicted scandal left a trauma
God’s theater was a turning point in Tommila’s life, although she states now – still feeling a little relieved – that the act was treated with surprising understanding in the industry.
After the wild experiences, Tommila retreated more and more tightly into her shell. Privacy became sacred.
The media left a particularly bad taste for Tommila. He is still suspicious of journalists and interviews.
– It left a bit of a traumatized boy. I have avoided publicity since then. So much untrue stuff came out of it then. They wanted to make things look worse than they were.
For almost the entire 1990s, Tommila acted almost exclusively in Jari Halonen’s films. As a result of the collaboration, the films *Lipton Cockton in the Shadows of Sodom* and *Christmas Party* were created, among others.
– We were quite a welded group. It was a very fruitful time. We actually worked day and night, and everyone did everything because there was little money.
Later, the films were even raised to the status of cult classics, but they didn’t make much money. It was a problem, because the fines that fell from God’s theater weighed on it.
– They were paid little by little. Of course, to some extent I was pissed off about them, but payment schedules could be agreed upon.
When the storm of private life came over, the separation, Tommila decided to put the whistle in the bag for the established work group.
– I had to say that I will leave.
The wife’s brother became Tommila’s new radar pair
From Jalmari Helander, Tommila got a new pair of radars, a long-term cooperation pattern, which the actress thinks is simply the best way to make art. The laudatory reception of *Sisu* gives weight to Tommila’s opinion.
– When you work with the same people, you develop a common language. Let’s get closer to some kind of complete work of art. It has been a more fruitful way for me than bouncing from one group to another.
Mother’s new boyfriend was a lost father figure again
When mother’s new boyfriend went to sea, ten-year-old Tommila was upset. The father figure he dearly missed was the captain of the cargo ship, the first mate. The work trips were long, they extended far around the world.
An even worse disappointment was when the mother had to end the relationship after three years of dating. The man was often in trouble. From the child’s point of view, it didn’t matter.
– I liked him. He was a special guy in the sense that he was nice on the surface, even nicer on the flip side. I never had any problem with him, but I do understand that mom had to do that.
Encounters are the building blocks of roles
As an actress, Tommila observes the world in an exceptional way. People and encounters are building material for him for future roles.
Tommila got the model of a worker while working at a construction site, something also stuck with her as a window washer. Debts had to be paid.
– I have made a lot of use of the people I have met there. Kept them in mind.
Tommila joined the army as soon as possible, at the age of 17. Around the same time, her mother found a new man, a veteran with shrapnel all over his body. According to Tommila’s memories, he was wounded in the war twice.
– We didn’t have time to make friends with him. I was already leaving home.
Now, when Tommila thinks about it, as a little boy, her model of a man came mainly from war veterans. They carried experiences with them, according to Tommila, many of them had difficulties moving forward with their lives.
– It’s stuck in the back of your mind. That’s how I went when I did this role of *Sisu*.
*What kind of thoughts did the article arouse? You can participate in the discussion until 23:00 on January 30.*