JE’VIDA

The 6th Annual Sámi Film Festival returns to Scandinavia House this February! This year’s program will include in-person screenings on February 9 & 10 and virtual screenings from February 8 through 11. On opening night at 7 PM, see director Katja Gauriloff’s critically acclaimed feature film Je’Vida. *This film will screen in-person only.*

Je’vida is a reserved old woman who, after her sister’s death, returns to her childhood home in Lapland with her niece, Sanna, to empty the house before it is to be torn down. Upon finding the traditional headdress of an indigenous Skolt Sámi wife, a šaamšiǩ, the house starts to speak to her, and suppressed memories begin to return. It is revealed that the withdrawn and distrusting aunt had been a victim of the assimilation policies, and the niece must make a big decision. By taking interest in each other, they find value in themselves and their roots.

An official selection at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival after making its World Premiere in the International Narrative Competition of the Tribeca Film Festival, Je’Vida has been hailed as “a strong and assured filmmaking debut” (The Spool) and “an ode to the importance of home, family and a sense of belonging” (Eye for Film).

The Festival will continue on Saturday with a screening of Short Films. Read more here. 

The Festival will also include Virtual screenings. *Je’Vida will screen in-person at Scandinavia House only.*

Presented as a partnership between the National Nordic Museum in Seattle and Scandinavia House in New York, The Sámi Film Festival includes a variety of contemporary and historical Sámi features, documentaries and short films, with selections by guest curator Liselotte Wajstedt, a Sámi filmmaker from Sweden and the director of The Silence in Sápmi and Sire and the Last Summer (dir. Liselotte Wajstedt, Sweden, 2022). Since originating as a partnership between the National Nordic Museum and Pacific Sámi Searvi in 2018, The Sámi Film Festival has become an onsite event drawing audiences from the East and West Coasts.

ABOUT THE DIRECTOR

Award-winning film director Katja Gauriloff (b. 1972) is well-known for her influential films, which have been screened and awarded at various festivals around the world. Canned Dreams and Kaisa’s Enchanted Forest have been both part of the Berlinale festival and Kaisa’s Enchanted Forest opened the Berlinale NATIVe section in 2017. Gauriloff received Best Documentary Film at the Finnish National Film Awards  in 2016 for her film Jussi. Her first feature fiction was Baby Jane (2019), and Je’vida is the first feature film in the Skolt Sámi language in history. Gauriloff lives and works in Rovaniemi, Northern Finland.