Mikko Niskanen grew up among farmers in Central Finland whose livelihoods were threatened by a rapidly modernizing postwar economy. The demise of their culture forms the basis for Eight Deadly Shots, in which Niskanen painstakingly reconstructs events leading up to a crime that horrified Finns in the early seventies: the killings of four policemen by a poor tenant farmer. Niskanen himself gives a convincing performance as the farmer whose mounting debts, hard drinking, and withdrawal from his wife and community come to this desperate, feeble act of rebellion. The film is devoid of sentiment or pity; the narrowness of the farmer's life is as unsettling as the insensitivity of the tax officers and policemen, so that while condemning the capitalist forces that act against the farmer, Niskanen boldly refuses to justify his murders. "A dedicated and almost wholly personal achievement by Niskanen. The naturalistic observation of everyday rural life is magnificent, the slow, inevitable build-up of pressure almost unbearable." (National Film Theatre, London) This feature-length European release version was made from the original five-hour film.