CALL ME DADDY
DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
CALL ME DADDY is a hybrid documentary film about sugar dating relationships in contemporary Finland. Combining documentary and fictional storytelling, the film explores the commodification of sex life and the definitions of intimacy through sugar dating.
Director & Writer: Inka Rusi
DOCUMENTARY FEATURE | 90’ | STATUS: in development
The project has been awarded a one year working grant from Kone Foundation and a development grant from the Finnish Film Foundation in December2023.
FINLAND
RELEASED FILMS
BRAINWASHED: SEX-CAMERA-POWER (2022)
“FIERCE AND FOCUSED… BRAINWASHED IS A BRACING BLAST OF CRITICAL RIGOUR.”
- Peter Bradshaw, THE GUARDIAN
“BRAINWASHED WILL FOREVER CHANGE HOW YOU LOOK AT FILMS.”
—Kate Erbland, INDIEWIRE
“BRAINWASHED IS ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT FILMS ANYONE CAN WATCH RIGHT NOW”
— Joey Soloway, producer/director
2022 “BEST OF FESTS” AT IDFA
BRAINWASHED: SEX-CAMERA-POWER is a feature documentary based on director Nina Menkes's cinematic presentation, ‘Sex and Power, the Visual Language of Cinema’ and uses film clips by A-list directors from 1896 through to the present, to show how sexist shot design contributes to a pervasive environment of sexual harassment and assault, as well as employment discrimination against women, especially in the film industry.
Inka Rusi is Creative Producer of the documentary together with Editor Cecily Rhett, overseeing the narrative arc of the film and visual design of the film clips included in the film.
BRAINWASHED: SEX-CAMERA-POWER is presented by Tim Disney, Susan Disney Lord, Abigail Disney & Menkesfilm, with additional support from the EOS World Fund and CalArts Center for New Performance.
The film premiered in 2022 at the Sundance Film Festival, following with Berlinale Panomama, CPH:Dox, Frameline Film Festival, BFI London Film Festival and IDFA among others.
FEATURE DOCUMENTARY | 107' | USA | 2022 | Directed by Nina Menkes
www.brainwashedmovie.com
SHORT FILMS
BIND
“Over the years I have watched so many shorts about sexual exploitation that didn't have anything to say and felt oddly exploitative themselves, so it was really great to see a short like BIND that evolved beyond that. A gut punch of a short… Also, stellar first shot.” - Levin Menekse, Writer & Producer
A teenage girl comes to terms with her father whose for-your-own-good tough love hides a need for control. BIND is Inka Rusi’s Thesis Film from California Institute of the Arts.
Director & Writer Inka Rusi. Producers Sara Fenton & Tanja Rusi. DoP Richard Van
Executive Producers Nina Menkes, Tomi Alapaattikoski, Lauri Markkanen and Jolyon Neubert
CAST: Emma Halleen, Tim Cummings and Nick Marini
This film was made with the generous help of The Markkanen Family Foundation, The Finnish Cultural Foundation, The Alison Doerner Fund for Women Pioneers in Filmmaking, Oskar Öflunds Foundation, The CalArts Thesis Grant, Tomi Alapaattikoski and Jolyon Neubert
The film has been selected to the 2021 CAA Moebius Showcase, 2021 Florida Film Festival, 2021 CalArts Showcase, Helsinki International Film Festival National Competition , 2021 Nordic Talents & the 2021 Tacoma Film Festival
SHORT FILM | 13' | USA/ FINLAND | 2021 | Directed by Inka Rusi
FOUL
In an impressionistic meditation on exclusion, on learning where you rank in the hierarchy and what you're going to do about it, FOUL focuses on one moment, totally formative yet totally ordinary, between three brothers as they fight for their place in line.
The film asks you to question the game, to wonder what happens when you grow up in a rubric where dominance is rewarded, where you're enabled to exclude and taught only to consider yourself embraced once somebody else is alienated.
Director & Writer Inka Rusi, DoP Kasimir Lehto
CAST: Oliver Ingman, Kristian Lehto, Jesim Arbib, Jenni Ingman
Selected for and shown at the CalArts Showcase 2019
SHORT FILM | 4' | USA/ FINLAND | 2019 | Directed by Inka Rusi
TOPCOAT
A poetic short film about kitsch.
CAST: Marjatta Nissinen, Boris Nordin
Selected for and shown at the Signes de Nuit International Film Festival held in Paris and was awarded the Night Award (Section Cinema in Transgression) The award honors films, which are able to balance ambiguity and complexity characterized by enigmatic mysteriousness and subtleness.
The film was funded by the Arts Promotion Centre TAIKE.
Watch the film here