2017 Essays

Katri Viita

Pennanen, Riikka

Katri Viita, born Karin Elisabet Viitainoja, is one of the pioneer female screenwriters of Finland. In fact, only two female scenarists are known to have worked during the silent era: Viita, who wrote Työn sankarilaulu/A Song About the Heroism of Labour (1929) and Gerda Hintze, the scenarist of Kajastus/Mirage (1930). Viita and Hintze worked around the same time: Työn sankarilaulu was filmed during the spring and summer of 1929 whilst Kajastus went into production during the fall of 1929. Unlike Hintze, Viita also worked during the sound era. It is important to acknowledge the challenge of identifying all of the crew members of silent-era Finnish cinema. For example, only a few crew members are credited in existing original opening credits and film programmes, which were available to cinemagoers. In some cases, resources like Suomen kansallisfilmografia/The Finnish National Filmography only identify the surname of crew members (Uusitalo et al. 1996). Furthermore, it is known that women working in film sometimes used gender neutral or masculine pseudonyms (Pennanen 2016).