“The Man Who Refuses to Die” is back and more determined than ever in explosive sequel Sisu: Road to Revenge, from returning writer/director Jalmari Helander (Rare Exports, Big Game).
In the over-the-top action sequel releasing in theaters on November 21, Aatami (Jorma Tommila) finds his quest to rebuild his home thwarted by the Red Army and the man who killed his family, Igor Draganov (Stephen Lang).
Helander once again finds truly inspired ways to violently dispatch bad men, this time on what’s essentially a dizzying road trip that sees Aatami wielding everything from tanks to planes as surprising murder weapons. It’s a seamless escalation of spectacle and action, yet one with a much more emotionally driven motive for our quiet, lone hero.
It makes for a triumphant, crowd-pleasing follow-up to Helander’s 2022 actioner, but the filmmaker was only willing to continue Aatami’s story if it felt fresh and worthwhile.
Luckily, the right idea struck the filmmaker like an epiphany. He tells Bloody Disgusting, “I was prepared not to do it if it won’t happen, but one day it just came to me like that: What if he wants to take his house back to Finland? Because I haven’t seen a film like that, somebody’s transporting his home, and how emotional cargo it is compared to a bag of gold, and how hard it is to move that around. It generates action and cool things, and you have to think about how to transport that.”
Stephen Lang stars in SISU: ROAD TO REVENGE. © 2025 CTMG, Inc.
“Of course I wanted to go bigger, and I also wanted to go more emotional, but I don’t like rules that much,” Helander says when asked about his approach to developing the sequel’s story.
With the key premise in place, Helander’s next step was designing the action, and Road to Revenge goes bigger in just about every way.
“It was fun to be trying to invent that,” the filmmaker says of creating the detailed action sequences. One of which entails a very thrilling vision of moving train carnage. “I always draw myself a model of the train, or I have train cars on a piece of paper, so I have to move around and try to think about how this would go in the best possible way. It’s cool, but it’s pretty hard work.”
It’s safe to say that Helander pushes his hero even further into splatstick territory with some of the kills, something that occasionally surprised the filmmaker when designing the action. “Sometimes it’s like, ‘Okay, why the fuck am I thinking with something like that?‘”
Jorma Tommila stars in Sisu: Road to Revenge
Also bigger and better in Road to Revenge is the gore; Helander tops Sisu in a variety of ways, especially in slaughter.
So much so that one set piece, in particular, quickly became all but impossible to work around the buckets of sticky fake blood. “I can’t tell you the exact number, but what I do remember being in the studio with the train sequence, everything was in fake blood, every fucking thing. The floors, it was like this, what’s going on here? You couldn’t touch anything, and it’s difficult to keep the cameras clean. The camera operators are wearing raincoats because it’s flying everywhere.”
The barrage of sticky blood, practical effects, and Helander’s bid to do as much in camera as possible meant an extremely tough shoot. “We actually did it pretty much chronologically, the whole thing, just because of that.”
As for influences, Helander cites some of the classics. However, he’s far more interested in creating his own vision and pushing past the brink of insanity. “Indiana Jones, the old James Bond films, stuff like that, are really important. I try not to copy too much. But most of the things are already done in some movies, so I just need to go crazier.”
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