Summer Book (2024)

 

"Var och en rör sig kring ön i egna sysslor som är så självfallna att man inte talar om dem varken för att få beundran eller sympati."

Jag läste om Sommarboken (det är minst 20 år sedan sist) efter att ha sett Charlie Mcdowells film The Summer Book. Det jag mest fastnar för är hur Tove Janssons roman beskriver det där ordlösa sysslandet också genom farmoderns och flickans kärva prat. Det riktigt viktiga kan man inte prata om, säger farmor till den jämnåriga Verner. Men ändå vill man prata om just det där viktiga, men det är ju inte på de specifika orden det hänger. Det handlar om sällskap, om att söka det, trivas med det, stå ut med det och ibland fly bort från det (t.ex. i ett tält eller en stor och stinkande rock). 

Jag blev genom filmen påmind om hur farmor och Sophia far och trynar (åländska för ett nyfiket och lite gränslöst halv-inkräktande) på ön där Direktören upprättat en villa som naturligtvis stör utsikten för farmor som vistats på sin holme 45 år och har vissa idéer om hur saker ska vara. Det går så illa att de blir påkomna i sitt trynande när Direktören med glop-son kommer iland. Lite motvilligt låter sig farmor och barnbarn bjudas på drink. 

Farmorn satte sig i en av rottingstolarna och Sophia hängde vid stolryggen och tittade under lugg. 

Se inte så arg ut, viskade farmorn. Dethär är sällskapsliv och det måste man klara. 

När jag läser Sommarboken slår det mig hur den borgerliga tolerans-linjens gränssättande (stå ut med, d.v.s. fördra, andras åsikter och sällskap) möter eller slits mot ett tryggt vilande i öppenheten. Ja ni vet, det där om att inte vara rädd för yttervärlden eftersom dörren alltid är öppen. Ofta skildras den här ganska mångsidiga mellanmänskliga terrängen genom det ordlösa. Som när farmor och Sophia väntar på Eriksson, som av vad jag begriper är en man från trakten, lite av en Snusmumrik-figur som går sina egna vägar. Texten låter förstå att Erikssons egensinne uppskattas, han tränger sig inte på och drar sina gränser, familjen lämnar dörren öppen och på midsommaren rustar man med middag utifall att han ändå skulle få för sig att vilja titta förbi. 

När jag denna långsamma söndag låg i bädden och läste boken slogs jag naturligtvis av hur jag fastnat för helt annorlunda saker än det som filmen Summer Book valt ut. Det är absolut inte en negativ sak, filmatiseringar är en påminnelse om den litterära textens möjligheter. Att personerna talar engelska är i min värld noll problem, förfrämligande kan vara bra. Huvudsaken: hurdan är filmen? Charlie Mcdowell låter sommardagarna sträckas ut och övergå i varandra. Det sysslas, utforskas, några utflykter görs, bland annat just till direktörens villa. Farmor håller efter mossan, barnet hittar en mask, pappan sitter och arbetar. Ibland är de tillsammans, men ensamheten spelar en stor roll. Eller: avskildheten, att dra sig undan sällskap. Det bästa är lugnet, tidens framskridande, snarare än händelser. Och tiden: den långsamma, men också flyktiga och brådstörtade. Här är det farmors åldrande som utgör smärtpunkten. Glenn Close stakar sig fram allt stelare, också hennes ansiktsuttryck tycks förändras, som att vissa miner stelnat till grimaser. Men det finns också en annan grundstämning. Familjen sörjer, var och en på sitt sätt. Pappan (Anders Danielsen Lie) har förlorat sin hustru och nu verkar han dränka känslorna i arbete. Och undvika sällskap. Barnet (Emily Matthews) känner sig ibland övergivet och argt. Farmor säger uppfordrande åt sonen att han inte ska vara självupptagen. 

Det är helt OK att som Mcdowell gör skapa en film om de här existentiella grundlägena. Men kanske blir det ändå lite för slätstruket? Och då menar jag inte som det episodiskt melankoliska utan i lite fumliga scener (manus: Robert Jones) som ska Betyda och där vi ska Veta vad som Händer. Med andra ord: trots att filmen är stillsam kapsejsar båten med jämna mellanrum över i sentimentalitet både i ord och bild.

Jag har också en smula svårt för fotot i Sommarboken. Jovisst det är skärgård, sol, mossa under fötterna, skuggorna över bergshällarna. Men blir det lite liksom generiskt? Som att filmen inte förmår skapa en alldeles egen värld utan mera bygger upp nostalgiskt skimrande glimtar av den Finländska Sommaren. Detta gör sig gällande också i musiken, både den diegetiska och icke-diegetiska, den skapar stämning men inte så mycket mer.

Och kanske är det just mitt problem med Summer Book: den lyckas inte riktigt göra något av det kluriga och djupa material som den har. Den fina, kontemplativa utgångspunkten bäddas in i en vilja att behaga. Glenn Close är på många sätt bra som farmor och Emily Matthews är också fin i sin ganska svåra roll. Men kanterna i romanen har hyvlats bort i denna rätt slipade grej. Mycket kan man säga om den nästan ihjälkramade Sommarboken. Men vill den behaga? Nix! Det är ju klös på alla möjliga vis, inte bara hos katten Ma petit, a.k.a. Mappe. Och på tal om katten: han är ju också en Eriksson-typ. Hämtar med sig presenter utan att bry sig så mycket om hur de tas emot, han går sina egna vägar. Och familjen lär sig så småningom att inte bara tolerera det, utan också tycka om det, se katten för vad den är och hur den är. 

Mummola (2023)

Kanske det börjar hända saker i den finländska filmen som skulle föra in andra saker än det vanliga slentrianmörkret och den skrikiga eller ljumna filmteatern? Tia Kouvos Mummola är en glad överraskning, äntligen finns det ett intresse för annat än att bara raktuppochner berätta en historia. Ramen är väl nog inte så exceptionell, för det är frågan om en skildring av ett julfirande och några därpå följande dagar. Kouvo har dock en förmåga dels att jobba med dialog och med bilder som understryker ett seende lite från sidan, man har vägrat lägga berättandet till rätta genom att filma så att tittaren får en illusion av att "se allt som finns att se". Jesse Jalonens kamera håller sig statisk och befinner sig vanligen på ett visst avstånd, slående ofta står vi i ett dörrhål och betraktar vad som rör sig in och ut ur bild, livets som inte ryms i en nätt ruta. Och samtidigt finns en dynamisk ljudbild som i många fall understryker scenernas stökiga rörlighet.

Mormor Ella, familjens matriark (Leena Uotila), har bjudit in till julfirande hos henne och den alkoholiserade maken Lasse (Tom Wentzel) som mest sitter parkerad framför sportrepriser på TV. I en av de första scenerna ser vi (ur en lite udda vinkel) döttrarna trängas med sin mor bland julstöket. Ella pladdrar på om att det renoverats på Citymarket och blivit så fint, "som i en amerikansk serie ni vet" [jag har förstått att filmen utspelar sig i Lahtis-regionen]. Döttrarna suckar, inte har ju nåt särskilt hänt i den butiken, vad dillar morsan om? Så här fortsätter det. I en dialog som är på kornet håller man låda på ett sätt som mest avslöjar avståndet mellan människorna, ett avstånd som man slagit sig till ro med. Därför kan man ägna sig åt skillnaden mellan smör och margarin eller, som Risto (en av döttrarnas man), i det oändliga orera om organisationsförändringar. När man träffar en ny person och inte klarar av att säga något vettigt blir det: "nå har du några sjukdomar?" Den yngre generationen ser och hör de äldres oförmåga att bryta upp gamla mönster. När alkoholiserade morfar knappt klarar av att sitta vid bordet (så full är han) är det den typ tioåriga dottern som klarsynt undrar hur det är möjligt att man kan tillåta honom att vara med. Men hon är samtidigt den enda som snackar rakt med honom om hans missbruk. "Är det inte dyrt att dricka så mycket, tänk hur mycket ni kunde resa och kanske renovera huset?"

Visst kan man kanske peka på några scener som vältrar över i sketchens komik men just på grund av dialogen och fotot, för att inte tala om ett ofta utmärkt skådespeleri, blir Mummola en film som träffar en och annan nerv. Vändningen i Tom Wentzels morfarfigur Lasse är också fint genomförd, och nog så trovärdig. Och Leena Uotilas Ella, med sitt outsinliga pippi på att ta upp grannens diabetes eller att säga saker som "ja var och en har ju sitt kors att bära" är makalös. 

En annan grej som jag tänkte på genom att jag djupdök på Arenan och såg lite annan finländsk film, är att Tia Kouvo har skippat ganska många av stereotypierna vad gäller skildringen av män och kvinnor. Eller, så här: här finns det managerande kvinnor och tysta män, men Kouvo låter också det komplexa komma in. Som just i Tom Wentzels roll. Jag är helt säker på att den här regissören kommer att göra intressant film i framtiden. 

Mummola, 2023.
Regi & manus: Tia Kouvo
I rollerna: Ria Kataja, Elina Knihtilä, Leena Uotila, Tom Wentzel, m.fl.

The Farwell (1981)

Overloaded with Bergmanite claustrophobia. Overwrought/confused script and silly dialogue. This would be a fair verdict of The Farwell, but still, there are other dimensions of Tuija-Maija Niskanen's rendition of Vivica Bandler's story about family bonds and the process of coming out that stand out. I don't think it is belittling to say of a film (or a book) that it was brave given its times. The Farwell treats same-sex desire in an interesting way and places homophobia within a patriarchal setting of male power and suffocating familial relations. Despite its many overheated scenes, the film captures what it is to long for another life, to long for a different path than the expected one. The style of the film reminds me of Victor Erice's poetic and gloomy cinematic world. Here, too, the world of the child is the point of departure. The camera pans around the aristocratic family apartment and its heavy furniture and dark colors. These images lets us into the world of Valerie, the main character, her secret longings and fears. Sometimes these images are too much, too obvious symbolism, but the cinematographer manages to create what seems to be an eerily closed space, the universe of the wealthy family in which secrets are to be kept by means of silent agreements. What makes the perspective quite unusual is that it is the young girl's rage which sets its mark upon the denouement. Not sadness or resignation - rage!

Hamlet Goes Business (1987)

Even though I consider myself a fan of Aki Kaurismäki's movies, I must admit Hamlet Goes Business cannot be counted among his better work. Our Hamlet this time around is a yuppie with money and murder on his mind. Daddy was the director of a company and Hamlet wants to do some real business now daddy's gone. Kaurismäki seizes the opportunity and throws in a few scenes about the new regime of business: factories are to be closed and big bucks are to be made - his uncles plans on selling the assets and investing in .... rubberducks that are to flood the worldwide markets. Hamlet acts like a first-class asshole: he does whatever it takes to get what he wants. So don't expect too much heady stuff. Kaurismäki crafts a work of pulp: b&w sleazy cinematography along with wonderfully wooden acting. Pirkka-Pekka Petelius & Kati Outinen are very good. Beyond that - not much to write home about.

Shadows in Paradise (1986)

Nikander drivers a garbage-truck. He's a lonely man. As it happens, Nikander meets Ilona, a supermarket clerk. One cannot exactly say that there is an instant spark because both of these people play it cool. They are afraid of each other, afraid of love, of closeness. The odds for their love affair are bad. However, Ilona is made redundant at the supermarket and as an act of revenge, she steals a box of money. She and Nikander run away...

This is Kaurismäki at his most minimalist - I mean, he always is, but this film is rather extreme - and it is also one of his funniest films. The humor lies in the sheer deadpan of everything: the lines, the acting, the events. Kaurismäki renders his characters with dignity and tenderness. He places them in opposition to the forces of the market and snooty representatives of the wealthier classes. The soundtrack includes blues, rock n' roll and Finnish schlager - the music sets a tone for the movie, its strange sense of hope. The locations drive home the point as well: the film takes us to bingo parlors, harbors and sleazy apartments. Kaurismäki's tenderness extends to these locations as well. Shadows in Paradise is a typical Kaurismäki-film in almost every sense. This didn't prevent me from being moved by it. The magic going on here is that in every single frame the downtrodden is approached from the point of view of: life can be better, it must. Kati Outinen and Matti Pellonpää are, of course, wonderful in their understated portrayal of shyness and resilience.

Rakkaudella, Maire (1999)

I must confess that I don't watch Finnish movies that often. And sadly, I remembered why when I saw Rakkaudella, Maire (Veikko Aaltonen), a gloomy film about a middle-aged woman who is obsessed with a woman whose husband has been killed. The biggest flaw is perhaps the script: the story shifts from social drama to some kind of surreal, hallucinatory state but this transition is not convincing (actually, the progression of the film is a bit clumsy). The writing seems overwrought and all conflicts are too crudely played out so that in every scene one knows exactly what is going on and what is going to happen next (even though the beginning of the film was quite interesting and promising). The acting is ok, and Susanne Ringell's performance is so good that I start to wish that the writer would have focused on her character instead. That would have been an entirely different story, and an entirely different fim. 

The White Reindeer (1952)

A 1952 horror movie about a women who transforms herself into a reindeer? Well, from this description, you might expect a cheesy B-movie rather than a lyrical, low-key film about  abandonment, fear and nature. Erik Blomberg's The White Reindeer (Valkoinen peura) is something of a hidden gem. Pirita is a young woman courted by Aslak. In the beginning of the film, we see them racing in a snow-covered landscape. However, an ominous tune has already changed the perspective and one expects something dreadful to happen. The couple is married and in a later scene, we see the woman herding a single reindeer but suddenly she sees a bigger herd, and her husband is one of the herders. That scenes is a moment when something deep takes place, but it is hard to spell out what. This is a film in which things and tensions are alluded to, hinted at rather than being dissected or clearly displayed. Something worries Pirita. One rather dull interpretation is to point out the sexual tensions between Pirita and Aslak: the film shows some advances by Pirita which are not returned.I n one of the most important scenes of the film she visits a shaman who says that he knows why she is there: he says that he can make a love potion if she sacrifices the first things she sees when she goes back, he brags about his prowess and beats his drum. All of the sudden, the camera focuses on Pirita's eyes; the drumming now continues on its own and the drum breaks. The husband goes away and as a present Pirita is offered a white reindeer. When Pirita goes back from the shaman, she sacrificed the reindeer. As the white reindeer returns in the movie, we know that it is a manifestation of Pirita's elusive and perhaps scary power. The herdsmen are convinced that the white reindeer is a witch, and they try to catch it. Interestingly, the film never settles on the nature of Pirita's power. A sense of mystery is preserved throughout.

The cinematography of Valkoinen peura is gorgeous and dynamic; the snowy landscapes is paired with shadowy huts and glaring moonlight. The reindeer are an important element of the film as it focuses on a form of life centered around these animals; the characters' relation to the animals cover a wide range and the film zones in on an ambiguity that seems to characterize the characters' attitudes to their fellow beings: reverence is paired with a desire to dominate (this ambiguity comes to the fore in the shape of the white reindeer which is a desirable catch because of its rarity). Mirjami Kuosmanen (who also wrote the story?) is great as Pirita; her acting is fierce and fragile at the same time and it is thanks to the acting that the subtlety and mystery of the film is maintained. In the end, I don't quite know what is so sinister about Pirita. A minus is the music which is at times a bit too "cinematic" and also too intrusive. Perhaps sinister is not the right word - Valkoinen peura is a bottom a film about loneliness. Pirita is abandoned by her husband when he goes to herd reindeer and the film repeatedly shows her fear of rejection and abandonment. The horror evoked by the transformation and Pirita's elusive power intermingles with a deep sadness.

The Earth is a Sinful Song (1973)

If it were not for the beautiful landscapes featuring in The Earth is a Sinful Song (dir. R Mollberg), I would probably not have been managed to sit through this film so revered in Finnish film history. Scarcely any stereotype about Finnish life is evaded. Excessive nudity: check. There is no end to people being killed: check. Hard drinkin': yep. Elusive nature: check. Saunas: check. Gloomy silence: c-h-e-c-k. Hard times, poor times: check. The story is set in Lapland during the late forties. A lively and independent girl falls for a reindeer cowboy, gets pregnant and well the relationship is not exactly a case of rosy bliss. Mollberg approaches this story with rough cinematograpy, amateur actors and plenty of haunting images of nature. Nautralistic scenes of animal slaughterings are coupled with just as naturalistic scenes of human encounters, often faltering or hard-boiled. The best parts of the film follow the daily life in the village, the social dramas accompanying the preparation of food, a troublesome calving process, or a visit by a frenzied (and scary) preacher. But usually Mollberg settles for the gruesome. The message is a simple one: life is tough as hell and people are mostly corrupt but life goes on and on and on in its basic flow of food, sex and chores. Life is squalor but there's also beauty. So why did I find this film hard to watch? I constantly felt that Mollberg was entirely preoccupied with etching an image, the image of this hard, unsavory life that other aspects of life were not at all detected. I also thought that the aesthetic expression of the film augmented this idea of life and that the naturalism used by Mollberg in this way became a sort of programmatic stance rather than working as an explorative and open-ended mode of looking at life.

Seven Songs from the Tundra (2000)

The surroundings of Seven Songs from the Tundra (dir. Lapsui & Lehmuskallio) are magical: the tundra of northern Russia. The film is a sort of compilation of stories from the Nenets people. This approach works well here, without the result turning out overly ethnographic (in the sense of distant). The stories circle around everyday life and even though the life of the Nenets are so different from mine, Seven Songs from the Tundra achieves this sense of the everyday. In one segment, a girl is about to be married off. The story takes place in pre-revolution times and the Nenets live close to nature, reindeer herding being the most important source of wealth. In later segments, we have proceeded to Soviet times. We see the Nenets within Soviet institutions, or as outcasts (some are accused of being 'kulaks'). In one wonderful section, two drunken men try to allure a local official to their drinking party. The official is not amused. Seven Songs from the Tundra is worth watching for its gentle pace, its beautiful cinematography and it also teaches us something important about Russian history.

Juha (1999)

It's not that surprising that Aki Kaurismäki took a shot with a silent movie. After all, he is known for his quiet movies which trade more in stylistic expressivism than modern senses of stylishness. Kaurismäki builds his own cinematic world in which the history of film always looms low and most of the time I like this slightly nostalgic approach to cinema. Juha takes off as rural drama and veers into a tragic story about the temptations of grim city life. This theme is of course present in other Kaurismäki movies as well. Here we have the farmer's wife who leave her husband only to end up in the arms of a Dennis Hopper-lookalike, an evil pimp. OK, so if you're after psychological realism, this is absolutely not for you. If you can stand a film comprising Kaurismäki's weird homage to the silent movie era, then you should give it a chance. - - - The carnevalistic score, however, didn't convince me and in my opinion, it didn't seem to be a good choice for this film. Juha is based on a novel written in 1911 but it is characterized by Kaurismäki's usual lack of respect for historical specificity.

The Diary of a Worker (1967)

To be honest, I had lots of preconceived ideas about what The Diary of a Worker (dir. Risto Jarva) would be like. I thought it would be stiff, doll-like actors screaming their way through a phony manuscript. Well, you know, this is what Finnish movies are often like, not all the time, but often enough. Well, I was wrong. This was a great film, with lots of artsy surprises to boot, a Finnish attempt at nouvelle vague (in a good way). Diary of a Worker does not shy away from expressing some chunks of left-wing politics. Jarva shows a society undergoing some drastic changes (in the sixties, urbanization in Finland was still underway.) It's a film about work, class differences and ideas about family life. Two young people - a welder and a secretary - fall in love and the film chronicles their everyday struggles and their hardships - and all this with a sort of hard-boiled matter-of-factness. The guy takes a job in another city and the girl has difficulties at her job, and withdraws into herself. I am not sure how common this was for Finnish movies in the sixties (honestly, I don't know) but the film's portrayal of how the war (WWII) left traumatic traces both in people who fought in the war, and the generation who lived with their parents' silence and strange reactions is gritty and unsentimental. The same thing goes for how the film tackles political disagreements. Jarva does not depict differences of opinions, but differences in attitudes to life. And usually he does this quite successfully. This is a film I must watch again. The editing technique alone makes this film worth watching. AND: some great music, too!

Varasto (2011)

I was positively surprised by Varasto (dir. Taru Mäkelä). One might see it as a light comedy with streaks of sitcom-TV logic, but it is also possible to see the film as a critique of class society. The film might have a humorous tone, but the image of the working class in contemporary Finland is very harsh. Anyone can be thrown into the fringes of society. Rouska and Raninen works in warehouse section of a paint shop. The job bores them and they kill time by playing darts. Rousks has an on/off affair with Karita. To earn a few extra euros, he makes under-the-table business with supplies from the store which he sells to a cynical communist. Rouska lives the ordinary bachelor life (eating meatballs directly from the package) until two things happens. Karita gets pregnant and the boss starts looking into the inventory in the shop. The tone of Varasto is sometimes just as cynical as the persons. Trust isn't possible; one always has to keep one's eye open so not to get screwed. The characters do everything to drive home their interests, at the workplace but also in private relations. The film does not take the perspective that this is how life has to be, but rather, that a specific economic situation is imprinted in people in the form of self deception. One might complain that the characters in the film remain one-dimensional stereotypes, but to be honest I didn't have that problem. Varasto is a good example of how a comedy can treat societal issues withiut becoming too preachy. In this, it has much in common with American screwball comedies from the thirties. 

Le havre (2011)

It is nice to see that Aki Kaurismäki has so many fans in NYC. Many of his films have been screend this fall in the IFC cinema. For sentimental reasons, I went to see Le havre on X-mas eve. I was terribly late, and had to run through Greenwich village to catch the film. I slumped down in the chair in the first row and was thrown into the utterly familiar world of Kaurismäki. You recognize the places, the stern-faced people, the story. Even the music seems familiar. Kaurismäki has returned to France, but his rendition of life in a port town does not rely on local details. Cafes and streets and apartments - look like they always do in a Kaurismäki film (a blend of realism and artificiality). I don't have a general opinion on whether this is a weakness in Kaurismäki's ouvre. Yes, they are mannered, romantic odes to the simple life and the bohemian way. His characters are familiar too. They are kind, or evil, and speak in essentials only.

The drama in the films could be highly political, but it turns out the material is not politicized, except for during a few moments in the film. Marcel Marx is a shoe-shiner but also a bohemian man. When he comes home from work his wife has dinner ready for him. When his wife gets sick and is hospitalized Marx' world is turned upside-down. One day, having lunch at the quay, he sees a small boy in the water. Le havre is a transit town for illegal immigrants en route for England. Idrissa, as the boy is called, has run away from the French authorities who found the container where he and his co-travellers were hiding. Marx, and his friend, help the boy. It is a beautiful film about kindness and help. At its best, Le havre is a heart-warming fairy tale that has a connection with complicated political realities. Goodness, here, is not described as anything particular: Marx simply sees the boy, and cares for him. A criminal inspector - modeled after every stylized rule in the noir book - simply regains his sanity and goes against his profession. I like that understanding of what goodness is.

On the other hand, there is a disturbing element of the film that has to do with the things I noted above, Kaurismäki's tendency to be locked into his own world. In this world, a bohemian has a wife that tends to his every need, lives for him, has dinner ready. Kati Outinen is of course good as always (I must admit that seeing her weary face and hearing her non-fluent French almost made me cry), but the presentation of the relationship between husband and wife is a bit disturbing in its elevation of traditional gender patterns.

Drifting Clouds (1996)

Aki Kaurismäki makes the same movie over and over again. To some, that is a bad thing, an evident lack of imagination and renewal. I have kind of taken a liking to the world of Kaurismäki. Helsinki stripped down to a few bars, empty streets, trams. Conversational exchange no more complicated than "Do you want tea?" "I want coffee." And music, always the music. In one lengthy scene of Drifting clouds, we see a tango band perform. The musicians are elderly gentleman, silverhaired professionals. They perform two songs. The camera does not interrupt. Dubrovnik, a resaurant, is about to close. This is the last, mournful night. The band honors the history of the place. The backbone of the story is a bittersweet tale about capitalism and work. A deep economic crisis leaves the two main characters of the film, a couple, without work. Ilona was headwaiter at Dubrovnik. Lauri drove a tram. Without work, their life falls apart (but interestingly, not their relationship). At the end of the film, a decision is made. They want work, but it is not easy to find oneself a job where one is not fooled. The political message of the film can be interpreted in several ways, but one thing that is clear is that banks cannot be trusted and that Capital and Work are two different spheres: Capital is not interested in work. But if Capital is owned by a kind-hearted individual, things are different. But it is not its politics that make Drifting clouds a beautiful film, it's the style, and Kaurismäki's deadpan and unsentimental sense of humor. It's a heartwarming feel-good film that will probably leave you with a smile on your face. What it is not: it is not character progression, it is not a psychological investigation into the stress that unemployment will result in - and it is not a political film in the sense that it would have anything very interesting to say about economic structures. - On the other hand, this movie is a touching image of love and affection in that the film depicts a relationship that is never emotionally problematic. Yet, as you might have guessed, this is not your ordinary representation of devotion.

The Match Factory Girl (1990)

Aki Kaurismäki's films consist mostly of silences (he has also made a silent film). For the first 20 minutes of The Match Factory Girl, we hear no spoken words, but other sounds unravel the life-world of Iiris, a young girl who lives with her parents. We hear the rumbling sounds in the factory she works in. Snippets of news are presented (it's 1989 and the world is in turmoil). The first word we hear by a character, in this case Iiris, is, if I remember correctly, "a beer". These drawn-out silences are heavy with sadness, but Kaurismäki is also evoking proletarian gloom from a humorous point of view.

OK, so the story here is flooding with dead-pan humour and tongue-in-cheek miserabilism. Iiris has a lousy job. Iiris' parents are oppressive. When Iiris meets a man, he tells her, after one night together, that he has no intentions whatsoever of initiating a relationship. But Iiris is pregnant. He is not interested in having a child. An appointment at the doctor's. Iiris rests in a hospital bed. Her dad enters the room, utters a sentence of dour and insulting words, and equally dismissively, places an apple on the table next to her bed.

It's easy to describe the film: it's a blunt, dark, humorous fairytale. All scenes are extremely austere, in terms of dialogue, camera angle, composition - even set design.  One person at an internet discussion board called this film "a Finnish Jeanne Dielman". To me, that is a very apt, yet quite surprising comparison. Akerman's and Kaurismäki's vision of urban drabness have many similarities, and their sense for meticiously composing every frame can be seen as related as well. Or maybe because these two belong among my favorite movies. Unlike Akerman's Jeanne Dielman, diegetic music plays a big role in Kaurismäki's work. There is tango, rock n roll schmaltz. The scene in which Iiris, whose parents threw her out, sits in her brother's bachelor's pad, gazing at a pool table and listening to the jukebox (!) is simply heartbreaking. And FYI: The world can't have enough of Olavi Virta.

Män kan inte våldtas (1978)

Jörn Donner's adaptation of Märta Tikkanen's feminist classic Män kan inte våldtas might not be a masterpiece, but it is all right. My biggest disappointment with it is its focus. Yes, there are some important feminist points here (which I remember from the book) that Donner's film has not left out, but except those few moments, this is less a political tract than a thriller. It's about Eva, a librarian, who goes out to celebrate with her colleague. At the restaurant, they meet a man. The man invites her to his apartment. He rapes her. The rest of the film is about the revenge she plans to take on his action. What is so disappointing about the film is that the essential question of the book, "can men be raped?" gets very little space in Donner's take on the story. Instead, we see Eva stalking the man who raped her. She puts on a wig and tries to obtain details about his life.
Some of these scenes are successful in conveying what Eva goes through. There is one scene in particular that I liked. She has visited an ex, a lawyer, and stolen his gun. Eva goes to a garbage heap to practice with the gun. We see Eva's face and birds restlessly circling over the garbage heap. The quietness of the early morning is disturbed by the sharp sounds of the shooting. A garbage truck arrives at the place and in a long shot we see an endless string of garbage being poured out over the heap. It's a beautiful scene.
As I said, this is not a completely uninteresting film. I could help but notice that some parts of the dialogue seem pretty archaic ("do women have to become men in order to create a career for themselves?"), while others are highly relevant today (certain images of male and female sexuality that are still used as arguments in debates about rape). 
One peculiar aspect of this, and other Donner films, is that both Finnish-Swedish and Swedish actors are used.

Miehen työ (2007)

A Finnish film is incomplete without awkward silences, naturalistic naked bodies, suicide attempts and/or death, heavy drinking, men whom nobody understands. Miehen työ (2007) boasts all these ingredients. And more of the same. Yes, there are hints of a tongue in cheek, yes, certain moments are relieved by black humor but hell, this is such a traditional Finnish movie it's almost ridiculous.
During the first twenty minutes of Miehen työ, I couldn't stop thinking about L'adversaire. A man, Juha, is made redundant from his robust factory job. He feels his wife can't bear to hear it, so he acts as if he goes off to work every morning. He comes to take up a job that he cannot talk to his wife about. He offers women "services". The rest of the film is dedicated either to embarrassing or terrible moments between Juha and his customers, his increasingly difficult relationships with his buddies and, finally, the dramatically charged revelation.
Miehen työ could have been an interesting film had it focused on that which the title promises. "Miehen työ", "a man's work", is a concept connected with expectations about what a real man is supposed to do and, even as importantly, how he is to relate to his work. A real man wears a stained overall or a greasy suit. A real man has the stamina to make gruesome sacrifices (like Juha). A real man dies a little while at work. A real man toils and asks no questions.
Juha impersonates this ideal about male sacrifice in greates detail. His new job might be "untypical" and he finds it degrading. Just as degrading as he finds telling his family about having been sacked from his job. The film tries hard, real hard, to show us how disgusting some women are and how natural it is that he finds them repulsive. But he has to keep up appearances to prove that even he, a prostitute for Christ's sake!, remains true to the ideal. Stern-faced and white-collared, he commits himself to whatever service these women ask him for. In the face of the moment of revelation, he simply tries to reassure his wife: "I did it for you!" But this kind of exploration into the darker sides of Finnish work morale seems like an excuse to explore even seedier stuff. This theme is almost completely overshadowed by the Drama - and because of this, Miehen työ remains one of those conventional Finnish movies in which every man tries to kill himself and every woman is a nagging bitch.
Indeed, we don't know much about the wife. She is just that nagging bitch at home with the kids. You guessed it, she is mentally instable. Juha's job enrages her. But why? The director of the film, Aleksi Salmenperä, is not interested in looking into that question. It's funnier to create a poignant scene involving a hammer and an ankle joint.
Miehen työ revolves around male shame. But is Salmenperä really clear about the role of shame in Juha's life? Why is unemployment something beyond an economically strained existence - why is it considered shameful? What, exactly, is the film's perspective on Juha's failure in being a "breadwinner"? I am sure (I hope) he doesn't want to say that shame is the reaction of a person who has failed in sacrifice-as-responsibility - I mean: either there is sacrifice or there is shame.

"Tommi Korpela risteyttää Jeesuksen ja Speden loistavassa tulkinnassaan nurkkaan ahdistetusta miehestä, jonka uhrauksia vaimo ei ymmärrä oikein." Thank you and good night.