The Man Without A Past
film — Finland — 2002

8.0
Aki Kaurasemaki is the most respected Finnish film director. Does that say a much? What do you know about Finland? Have you heard the song "Finland, Finland, Finland - the country where I want to be"? Probably you have, and that`s a good thing. But apart from being Finnish Mr. Kaurasemaki is one hell of a director. In this cinematic masterpiece (I dare to say that!) he shows us the story of M - a middleaged guy who has just come to Helsinki when some crazy young assholes hit him in the head and steal everything he ownes. When he returns from his wounds to the real world M has lost the entire memory of himself. Everything else seems to be in order with him. He gets picked up by some poor people who try to help him get back on his feet, which he does. He gets a job at the Salvation Army and even falls in love with a woman working there. There`s quite an interesting part of the movie when M is in the bank and its robbed by a man who wants to get his money back from it to be able to repay his workers, for which he later hires M. And there`s also a man who has a vicious dog named Hannibal, but it turns out that the dog isn`t a slightest bit vicious, and it`s a female dog bearing the most masculine name. The film is positive, despite it showing the lowest parts of Helsinki. At least I enjoyed it a lot, and so would you, if you knew the finnish language or at least like I didn`t mind watching the film with subtitles.
2004-08-03
comments powered by Disqus