Review: Mannerheim ja saksalainen suudelma

Marski’s nervously sarcastic humour is refreshing.

“My only task is to make sure that Finland does not disappear.” This task, with Carl Gustaf Mannerheim as his backbone, walked through his life. The pace of the performance, which weighs up the actions of three commanders-in-chief of war and a two-time head of state, is military at the Helsinki City Theatre.

The events of the purposefully progressing story take place during the Civil War and the Continuation War, at a time when Mannerheim was striving to ensure that Finland would not have to yield to its ally Germany.

Persuasive men

Asko Sarkola’s Mannerheim is firm and unwavering. This, of course, is demanded by an issue that repeatedly ends up on his desk, the fate of the Finnish people. Sarkola’s way of flashing other kinds of features of his hard-boiled character is quite astonishing. Even the warlord has his short, soft moments.
Pertti Sveholm, Unto Nuora, Kari Mattila, Antti Timonen, Matti Olavi Ranin, Matti Rasila, Eero Saarinen and Tommi Rantamäki, who can be seen as colonels, majors, generals and statesmen, are all convincing, i.e. exuberantly upright in their roles.

Pertti Sveholm also gives a memorable role as the humane lord of the manor, Hjalmar Linder, who is fiercely opposed to the executions of the Reds in prison camps.

Eero Saarinen, on the other hand, brings a nice amount of life to the reserved characters in the role of President Hoover and especially the German Field Marshal Keitel.

Awakens and moves

Although instead of massacres, warfare in this work is more like maps spread on the tables by fierce gentlemen, the performance manages to provoke thoughts and even move. For this, thanks go to director Kari Heiskanen. In the case of spoken theatre, there is a risk that shockingly large decisions related to war strategies would remain at the level of mere words. However, thanks to Heiskanen’s guidance, this does not happen. The performance also manages to get under the skin by letting the numbers speak for themselves. The number of fallen and languished in prison camps stops even the most hardened in their tracks.

Authentic images of the chaos caused by war bring in an aspect of human suffering. Informative projections of the notable people in the performance are also a remarkably good choice, if only because they make the performance more accessible to people other than experts in military history.

Wounded the invulnerable

Small glimpses diversify the picture of a warlord who can withstand anything. Among other things, the fact that Mannerheim did not get a life partner in Kitty Linder (Kirsi Karlenius) has clearly wounded the invulnerable. The Marshal’s nervously sarcastic humor is refreshing, as is his surprising empathy.

In one scene, Mannerheim summons an aide-de-camp, whose brother’s name can be seen on the list of wounded. The Marshal borrows his car, sends the adjutant to the hospital and tells him to deliver his personal greetings to the brother.

By all accounts, the warlord was only human.