Koko Production was founded in 2017 by director–producer–screenwriter Mina Laamo, a visual artist with two decades of experience working in film.
Mina Laamo is known for the creative documentaries Sorrow Tamers (Surunkesyttäjät, 2022), Becoming Me (Matka minuksi, 2015) and The Pests (Tuholaiset, 2007). In her films she has explored grief, the sense of inadequacy, and fear of otherness.
Her media art installation Four Trick Pony, co-created with Pia Andell, exhibited at the Turku Art Museum in 2020–2021. The work will be exhibited at Laterna Magica Helsinki in the autumn of 2024. At the moment, she is in the development process of a documentary film entitled A Nature Documentary on Dying Birds. A creative documentary In the Borderland, directed by Elina Hyvärinen and produced by Mina Laamo, will be released soon.
Mina Laamo graduated from Aalto University majoring in Documentary Film. She also obtained another Master of Arts degree, majoring in Comparative Literature and Gender Studies, from the University of Helsinki.
She lectures and writes about documentary filmmaking with enthusiasm and passion.
A Nature Documentary on Dying Birds
(Luontodokumentti kuolevista linnuista)
IN DEVELOPMENT / FINLAND / CREATIVE DOCUMENTARY / APPROX. 60’
In my lifetime, approximately 600 million nesting birds have vanished in the European Union.
About half of the sparrow population is gone – a total of 247 million birds. Half of the bird species in Finland are endangered or near threatened. Thanks to the bird-counting efforts of thousands of birdwatchers, birds are the most studied species group in Finland. Their state reflects the vitality of nearly all habitats.
Some of the major causes for loss of biodiversity include climate change and habitats being destroyed and degraded by humans.
This documentary film explores the question of why knowledge is not enough. Why are people not realising the gravity of loss of biodiversity and the sixth mass extinction happening around us? Experts, thinkers, conservationists, and futurists discuss what could bring about change in the way people think and act: Why are we so feverishly against change? Why do we come up with excuses when we should roll up our sleeves and get to work? Should our approach to the world, environment and ourselves be fundamentally different?
More info: climatestorylabnordic.org/
SCRIPTWRITER & DIRECTOR
Mina Laamo
CINEMATOGRAPHERS
Cristal Alakoski
Jarkko Virtanen
EDITOR
Tuuli Kuittinen
SOUND DESIGN
Janne Laine
IMPACT COORDINATOR
Riitta Ryhtä
PRODUCER
Mina Laamo
PRODUCTION COMPANY
Koko Production
SUPPORTED BY
KONEEN SÄÄTIÖ
AVEK
TJNK
KMS
SELECTED TO BE PART OF
The Climate Story Lab Nordic
2023-2024
In the Borderland
Rajalla
IN POST-PRODUCTION / FINLAND / CREATIVE DOCUMENTARY / 73’
The waves of change hit a small town on the Russian border in Eastern Finland, far away from the front line, when the Russian attack on Ukraine in 2022 turned the European worldview upside down.
In a small town in Eastern Finland, Parikkala, near the Russian border, this soon became very real as the iron curtain lowers again on the Finno-Russian border and the project of opening an international border crossing point collapsed. The fruitful cooperation that has been established with the neighbour country over decades is wasted in an instant. Local newspaper editors, business owners, members of the city council, border officials and other people in the area are faced both with a new kind of future that is unknown to them and the heavy historical baggage of the borderland.
The film follows the everyday life of heartwarming people in Parikkala, who find themselves between the old and new era, when world politics escalate and change the life of the town and its people as well their thoughts on the border. From a vantage point between the border poles, the film follows what happens as the iron curtain lowers again on the Finno-Russian border, and the future no longer holds what was expected only a short while before.
SCRIPTWRITER & DIRECTOR
Elina Hyvärinen
DIRECTOR OF CINEMATOGRAPHY
Jarkko Virtanen
EDITOR
Nikke Bagge
SOUND DESIGN
Janne Laine
ORIGINAL MUSIC
Emil Sana
PRODUCER
Mina Laamo
PRODUCTION COMPANY
Koko Production
IN CO-OPERATION WITH
Yle / Jenny Westergård
SUPPORTED BY
SES
AVEK
Karjalan kulttuurirahasto
TAIKE Kaakkois-Suomen taidetoimikunta
Suomen kulttuurirahaston
Etelä-Karjalan rahasto
Sorrow Tamers
(Surunkesyttäjät)
2022 / FINLAND / CREATIVE DOCUMENTARY / 66’
An art-house-documentary film about individuals, who have decided to face the sorrow as it exists to them. Sorrow always shakes up the life we used to know, and everything is changed. Changed how? You do not know, unless you fearlessly step into the world of grief and, without fearing the change, step out in due course as a new, transformed version of yourself.
Life is learning how to let go before death, the ultimate momentum of letting go.
Shot on film, the short episodes of individual stories form a larger story of the finite nature of life and the intrinsic need of human beings to reach out to each other, even when it is not possible.
"An outstanding piece of direct cinema turned art cinema, offering a glimpse into the human soul at the moment of suffering."
"Showing the urgent need to know our feelings better is one of the many qualities of this magnificent film best described as a hybrid of documentary and artwork. But don’t be misled. While the tag «art cinema» conventionally signifies a certain degree of generalised abstraction, this film is an outstanding document precisely because it intertwines with art. The purely imaginary, «artistic» parts of the film further add to and enforce the potentials of direct cinema and directly contribute to the capacity of this film to show something that we did not even know that can be seen. It helps us know our souls better."
Read more: Modern Times Review
SCRIPTWRITER &
DIRECTOR
Mina Laamo
DIRECTOR OF CINEMATOGRAPHY
Päivi Kettunen F.S.C.
EDITOR
Tuuli Kuittinen F.C.E.
SOUND DESIGN
Janne Laine
CREATIVE PRODUCER
Atte Karttunen
PRODUCER
Mina Laamo
PRODUCTION COMPANY
Koko Production
IN CO-OPERATION WITH
Yle / Jenny Westergård
SUPPORTED BY
SES
AVEK
KMS
TAIKE
SELECTED TO BE PART OF
Twelve for the Future
2018-2019
Effects used in the film from Freesound.org under the Creative Commons 0 License (CC0 1.0) and the following effects under the Attribution License (CC BY 3.0): • thatjeffcarter: We Listen - melody / https://freesound.org/people/thatjeffcarter/sounds/141865/ • OSFX: Standing above a reactor / https://freesound.org/people/OSFX/sounds/420538/ • Mat397: Polyflute pad / https://freesound.org/people/Mat397/sounds/485078/ • striptheband: Ambient Groove 002 / https://freesound.org/people/striptheband/sounds/52020/ • YleArkisto: An aeroplane, passenger plane, propeller aircfaft, DC-3, Dakota, taxing, taking off / https://freesound.org/people/YleArkisto/sounds/256049/
Four Trick Pony
2020 / FINLAND / DOCUMENTARY INSTALLATION / ENDLESS
Four Trick Pony is a video installation constructed of the personal film and video archives of two documentarists. It consists of four parts, each associated with a prime number. Together they generate endlessly new combinations. Unique at every moment, it repeats the same only every 12th day.
The work uncouples itself from the bonds of documentary cinema, the tradition of narrativity, and the logic of causality.
Prominent elements in the footage are experientiality, transitoriness, moment, attention, observation and awakening. The initial impetus for the work was the artists’ realisation of the ever-present demand for stories. Four Trick Pony is their way of exploring what happens when narrative is rejected. Do we always need a story, or can its fundamental purpose – reaching out emotionally to other people – be served also without a narrative? What alternative ways are there to tell about the world we live in?
The exhibitions:
Laterna Magica, Helsinki, Finland
15 Aug 2024 – 7 Sep 2024
Turku Art Museum, Turku, Finland
27 Nov 2020 – 21 Mar 2021
SCRIPTWRITERS &
DIRECTORS
Pia Andell
Mina Laamo
SOUND DESIGN
Janne Laine
PRODUCERS
Pia Andell
Mina Laamo
PRODUCTION COMPANIES
Koko Production
Of Course My Films
SUPPORTED BY
AVEK
TAIKE
TAIKE Uudenmaan taidetoimikunta
DISTRIBUTION
AV-arkki
