Aki Kaurismaki update--

"It has been four years since the completion of Kaurismaki's last feature film.
"Has it really been that long?"
There is a telling pause.
"Back in the day, I used to make three films a year, now it is one in three years, or in four. The old vim and vigour of youth has been blunted."
That earlier pace was way too fast, Kaurismaki admits: all the "messages" have just about been passed. What is left is telling stories.
"Then again, it is better to do it when you are young, because later it is too late. You are only young once, as Henri Murger headed the final chapter of his Scenes de la Vie de Boheme." The book was the source both for Puccini's opera and Kaurismaki's own film from 1992.
Kaurismaki ponders long and hard in silence.
"No, it can't be four years. What's happened to all the years in between?"