Long Good Thursday (Mielensäpahoittajan Rakkaustarina)

 

Director Mika Kaurismäki

Heikki Kinnunen and Jaana Saarinen

Author Tuomas Kyrö

Mika and Aki from yesteryear

LONG GOOD THURSDAY (Mielensäpahoittajan Rakkaustarina)             B-                           Finland  (97 mi)  2024  d:  Mika Kaurismäki

The older Kaurismäki brother has always lived in the shadow of his more internationally acclaimed younger brother Aki, whose decades-long success on the arthouse festival circuit has been undeniable, so Mika, co-founder of Sodankylä’s Midnight Sun Film Festival in 1986, the only film festival north of the Arctic Circle, has had to discover the road not taken, finding an alternative path outside Finland.  Spending much of his time living and working in Brazil, he first visited that country while making his extraordinary documentary, a poignant final portrait of the indomitable Sam Fuller taking Jim Jarmusch on a journey deep into Brazil's Mato Grosso jungle with the Karajá Indians he befriended forty years earlier scouting film locations in TIGRERO: A FILM THAT WAS NEVER MADE (1994), establishing a home base in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 where he began to focus on international co-productions, living there until 2019 when he left due to his political disagreements with far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, whose large-scale deforestation of the Amazon rainforest increased by 75 percent and led to four years of chaos, criminality and bloodshed.  He currently splits his time between Helsinki, Finland and Rio de Janeiro.  Mika’s films occupy that liminal space between past and present, featuring protagonists who are perennial outsiders, as in Road North (Tie pohjoiseen) (2012), and this film is no exception.  Adapted by Sami Keski-Vähälä from Tuomas Kyrö’s 2010 novel The Man Who Gets Upset About Things, the first of three published books about a stubborn old misanthrope simply known as The Grump, part of a continuing series based upon this same male character, The Grump (fictional character), originally heard on Finnish radio, where this is the fourth installment of the hugely popular film series in Finland, the last two directed by Mika, with Heikki Kinnunen replacing the original actor Antti Litja who retired after the 2014 film release.  A gentle romantic comedy about growing older, this film offers astute observations on aging, including family misunderstandings and the value of familiar surroundings, yet no one should ever underestimate companionship, having someone to share your life with in the twilight years, where their problems become your own, turning into a contemporary Finnish version of Mark Rydell’s ON GOLDEN POND (1981) as filtered through the iskelmä music of Agents / Esa Pulliainen - Love Is Blue (Instrumental) (Live) YouTube (3:24) and Tiet (Laila Kinnunen) YouTube (4:00), offering a window into the Finnish soul (The hidden memory of the nation - Finnish Music Quarterly).   

If we take a step back from all the different contexts in which Mika has worked, we can see an elaborate multicultural mosaic, where his films take place in different national contexts, which are often clearly distinguished as such, exploring questions of Finnish national identity, like the music of Juice Leskinen - Luonas kai olla saan - Saimaa-ilmiö YouTube (2:22), which can be traced back to a documentary movie made by the Kaurismäki brothers in 1981, THE SAIMAA GESTURE (Saimaa-ilmiö).  More recently, Mika has developed a propensity for happy endings, in stark contrast to his earlier films which culminate in ambiguous or distinctly bleak terms.  Set in the lush days of a Finnish summer, shot by Jari Mutikainen, with a musical score by Japanese composer Tetsuroh Konishi, this commercially accessible film is a sentimentalized look at what happens when you grow older, when many of the familiar faces you’ve known and the things you’ve loved in your life are gone, where your life appears to be at a standstill, not really knowing which way to turn, dissatisfied with everything in general.  Meet the Grump, played by Finnish comedy star Heikki Kinnunen, the farmer in a plaid shirt with an enormous fur hat on his head, a man of few words and a constant scowl on his face, who doesn’t really care about the modern world, yet when he runs into a free-spirited artist who has traveled the world named Saimi (Jaana Saarinen) in a grocery store, of all places, she’s intent on using him as a model for her photography.  This is a scenario where a bubbly, upbeat woman meets a typically stoic Finnish man who values his independence and doesn’t say much, given to terse, laconic answers, emblematic of a small country with an introverted culture, where you have to read between the lines to understand the distinctly Finnish appeal of their relationship, where the underlying theme becomes “Ordinary is enough.”  His grumpiness is a protective shield against the world’s injustices, like having to deal with his nosy, scrap collecting neighbor of many years, Kolehmainen (Silu Seppälä), who appears to spy on him and hilariously hears everything he says (which he confirms, at one point, breaking the third wall), becoming the bane of his existence, or his two straight arrow sons Hessu (Iikka Forss) and Pekka (Ville Tiihonen), who seem hell-bent on pushing him into a retirement home, afraid of losing their inheritance money, skeptical that he can live on his own and manage his extensive property, believing it’s all for the best, yet utterly blind to the obvious, as that’s the last place he wants to be. 

We see the Grump speaking to a tree trunk with his and his late wife’s initials carved on it, as she meant everything to him, leaving a giant void in her absence, yet their home which they shared together provides him with mementos and traces of her familiarity, offering a comfort that he can’t find anywhere else.  This is an essential aspect of his life, the core of his being, finding it hard to move on, seeing no obvious signs when he speaks to her, strangely concluding “Silence was always a sign of consent for us,” where one thing that may be surprising for some is that when you get older you appreciate things a little more.  An examination of the brooding Finnish male, there is no escaping the pull of national nostalgia and the problematic masculinity repeatedly evoked as part of the national mentality, where the Grump is happier working with an axe in his hand cutting wood, or finding himself alone in the rural landscapes of forests and lakes with nobody bothering him than he is being around people.  While he’s clearly taken with Saimi, particularly her headstrong individualism and special fortitude, it’s another thing to acknowledge it, where the man would rather die a thousand deaths than openly reveal his feelings, where his attempts at making a compliment are a picture of awkwardness, but he’s impressed that she’ll stop what she’s doing and go on an adventure at a moment’s notice, never having to explain herself.  Accordingly, they go on motorcycle rides together, or camp in the woods, where she eagerly jumps in the lake under the moonlight, but he’s torn by the idea that he’s betraying his wife, feeling guilt and remorse, but a good thing is a good thing, and he enjoys her company, even if he won’t admit it.  Surprisingly, Saimi has a black daughter Kukka (Ona Huczkowski) who’s a police officer that she’s extremely proud of, as she’s clever and equally free-spirited, the exact opposite of his clueless sons, who offer him no comfort whatsoever, as their concerns simply exist on another wavelength, tone deaf to what he’s going through, where it’s clear they’re missing any deep human connection.  Yet they’re all brought together for an outdoor, family style reunion that has a Buñuelian wit and humor about it, suggesting the world is never what it seems, as underneath the cantankerous irascibility there’s a distinct possibility of romance and hope in the air, making this a crowd pleaser, winning the Audience Choice award for an international feature at the Chicago Film Festival (Audience Awards Presented at 60Th Chicago International ...). 

Road North (Tie pohjoiseen)

ROAD NORTH (Tie pohjoiseen)         B             
Finland  (110 mi)  2012  d:  Mika Kaurismäki         Official site [Japan]

Mika is the older but less known of the Kaurismäki brothers, both among the founders of modern Finnish cinema.  Unlike the internationally acclaimed Dardennes and the Coens, the two Finns rarely work together, where the better known Aki began as an assistant, screenwriter and actor in his brother Mika’s earliest works, whose first film THE LIAR (1980) was an overnight sensation.  Mika was inspired by Finnish film historian Peter von Bagh’s book History of Cinema, studying cinema in Munich at the Hochschule für Film und Fernsehen before returning to make films in Finland.  In the 1980’s he and his brother, along with various colleagues and friends, co-founded the Villealfa Filmproductions, a no frills, low-budget film studio that by the end of the decade became the third biggest production company in Finnish film history, while Mika also co-founded the only film festival north of the Arctic Circle, the Midnight Sun Film Festival in 1986.  By the 90’s however, Mika and Aki started to produce their films separately through their own production companies, with Mika living in Rio de Janeiro since 1992 mostly making documentary films, where perhaps his most memorable is TIGERO:  A FILM THAT WAS NEVER MADE (1994) with Sam Fuller and Jim Jarmusch.  This script was written in the 80’s, where it was originally entitled Road South, traveling from the north of Italy south to Sicily, but the project fell through when the lead actor had scheduling difficulties, so it’s had a long gestation period.  In total, Mika has done seven road movies, culminating with this film, which is built around a lovable star, Vesa-Matti Loiri, Finland’s most popular actor, comedian, and singer, best known for his role portraying Uuno Turhapuro, a comedic character that originated in early 1970’s Finnish television, continuing his portrayal in a total of 20 movies between the years 1973 and 2004.

This darkly comic and touching road movie follows the unlikely scenario of a ne'er-do-well, outcast father Leo (Vesa-Matti Loiri) absent for 35 years finally paying a visit to his long-lost son Timo (Samuli Edelmann), where there’s obviously more than just a gap of time missing between these two polar opposites.  Timo is seen onstage playing classical piano for a Sibelius Piano Quintet, Jean Sibelius - Piano Quintet in G Minor, JS 159 ... - YouTu (5:26), while Leo, who has a ticket for the performance, is drunk and asleep on his doorstep by the time Timo arrives home, announcing he is his father while offering him a gesture of good will, an already half-open bottle of whiskey.  While Timo is something of a joyless workaholic concert pianist separated from his wife and daughter, largely due to his incessant need for practice when he is home and prolonged absences on tour away from home, Leo is more of a good-natured opportunist and scoundrel used to taking advantage of people and situations, traveling on a Paavo Nurmi Finnish passport, where he thrives on the moment.  While Leo is a consummate liar, often getting lost in his own fabrications, Timo reluctantly agrees to accompany him on what he thinks will be a brief afternoon jaunt out of Helsinki to visit a sister he never knew he had.  Instead this turns into a hilarious romp through the Finnish countryside as they head north to the Lapland driving a stolen Pontiac convertible.  While Timo is under the mistaken assumption that his father may fill in some missing details about his past, Leo is more interested in just having a good time, where spending time together with family is all that matters, which interestingly enough, is a similar theme in Alexander Payne’s Nebraska (2013), an exploration of America’s heartland that features another grizzled character in Bruce Dern.  Unlike Nebraska, which probably plays better in America, this film probably plays better outside Finland, as it exports a kind of broad-based Finnish humor rarely seen in the rest of the world, built upon fabricated storytelling and constant misdirection, as Leo is forever taking advantage of his son’s naïve gullibility.

Kaurismäki’s dark-edged humor has at its roots the absurdity of Eastern European rule, and while never occupied by the Soviets after World War II, Finland was forced to cede much of their land to the Soviets, returned a decade later. This placed them in a precarious position of being a nation caught between the East and the West, where few exploit that humor better than the Kaurismäki’s, who in films like Lights in the Dusk (Laitakaupungin Valot) (2006), or my absolute favorite Kaurismäki film ever made, Take Care of Your Scarf, Tatjana (Pidä huivista kiinni, Tatjana) (1994), often show remnants of an Eastern European mindset, adding stoic faces, rigid authoritarian rules, and a world filled with eternal gloom, often broken up by a wacky delight in Elvis, early rock ‘n’ roll music, and of course, drinking.  Unlike the wordlessness or typical deadpan in other Aki Kaurismäki films, Loiri couldn’t be more outlandishly appealing as an oversized oaf, who despite all his character flaws, means well.  The guy is a walking storyteller wherever he goes, where stories literally pour out of his mouth at the most inopportune times.  While Leo’s amusing practice of Finnish custom, visiting people unannounced and just walking right into their homes, has an endearing quality to it, as the film provides a nice observational feel where it’s continually feeding off of this forced intimacy of the two characters in a car, where they’re constantly at odds with their surroundings and the people they meet.  While the film is an odyssey into the family’s past, the scene of the film is an impromptu performance at a typically empty hotel bar where the father and son break into a superb rendition of “Autumn Leaves,” or “Dead Leaves” with Finnish lyrics, Tapio Heinonen - Kuolleet Lehdet ( Les feuilles mortes ) - You YouTube (4:12), followed by “Condemned to Walk,” Vesa-Matti Loiri & Samuli Edelmann - Tuomittuna kulkemaan  YouTube (3:56), where Loiri’s deep bass voice expressing heartbreak in the land of a thousand lakes works brilliantly, even as they pick up a couple of girls afterwards, adding a touch of romanticism to the absurdity of their adventure.  While the tone of wacky adventure is mostly fun, the film is wonderfully nuanced with small and intimate moments among the many roadside attractions that sensitively explores larger themes of family roots and redemption, magnifying the importance of shared moments, beautifully elevating the material with a touch of eloquence from the music of Schubert’s Piano Sonata in G Major, D 894 (Op. 78), opening movement, Molto moderato e cantabile, Franz Schubert.Sonata G-dur.1.Molto moderato e cantabile  YouTube (16:51).