MSL: Darker Tones

4K video
Stereo sound
Duration: 47 min
2025

Darker Tones is a fictional narrative built upon personal experiences and memories, raising questions about how reality is structured for the artists themselves. In the film, Jade Kallio and Antti Jussila portray themselves—aging performance artists who have worked together for 18 years in the MSL collective they co-founded.

The film takes the form of a road movie—a bleak, fear-tinged coming-of-age story during which the protagonists spiral downward as their internal moral compass disintegrates, ultimately leading them to a kind of self-acceptance: a hazy, entangled creation, like tightly compressed playdough.

The film also explores themes of aging, the hope for success and recognition, friendship, the uncertainties inherent in shared artistic thinking, and life within the parallel reality shaped by collectively created meanings and personas.

Director, Writer, Cinematography, Editing, and Sound Design
MSL/ Antti Jussila, Jade Kallio

Assistant Cinematographers
Mikko Kummala
Remi Vesala

Cast
Antti – Antti Jussila
Jade – Jade Kallio
Tuomo – Tuomo Tuovinen

Attendees at the memorial service
Remi Vesala
Emma Larkovuo
Kolya Kotov
Elina Nissinen

Music
MSL
Mörkrum
Niilo Apukka

Supported by
Kone Foundation

←