David R. Walker

Fallen Leaves

Director: Aki Kaurismaki

Cast: Alma Poysti, Jussi Vatanen, Janne Hyytiainen

Running Time: 1 hour 21 minutes

Film Rating: 7.5 out of 10

Language: Finnish with English subtitles

Festival: Durban International Film Festival

Finnish director Aki Kaurismaki presents his deadpan humour cinematically in the wonderful wacky romantic comedy Fallen Leaves starring Alma Poysti as Ansa Gronholm, a shelf stocker at a local supermarket in Helsinki and welder and Jussi Vatanem as construction worker Holappa who has a periodic drinking problem.

Despite the dreary lives of the two main characters, their courtship and blighted romance takes on an absurdist tinge as Fallen Leaves resembles more a Pedro Almodovar film with its characters dressed in primary colours, its scenes of bizarre Finnish nightlife involving bad Karaoke, where the characters are told to listen and appreciate. It’s as if Almodovar made a film set in Helsinki and not Madrid.

Fallen Leaves is filled with some hilarious scenes especially when Ansa received her electricity bill and cannot afford to pay it as she has been retrenched so she unplugs all the appliances. Then there are the karaoke scenes in which Holappa flirts with Ansa only later to ask her on a date at a dodgy looking art cinema named the Ritz, which culminates in him losing her phone number.

Ansa decides that men are completely unreliable and after she finds another low level job as a construction worker, she adopts a dog to keep her company. Holappa on the other hand jumps from job to job as he frequently takes to vodka to drown his sorrows and his miserable life. His only companionship is his fast talking older friend Hannes Huotari played by Janne Hyytiainen, who hits on younger woman only to be told he is too old for them even though he hasn’t hit 50.

Fallen leaves is a delightful 81 minutes, a brief snapshot into life in contemporary Helsinki in which most of the sparse dialogue is interrupted by radio reports of the ongoing Russian invasion of the Ukraine, which director Aki Kaurismaki snuck in there to provide a subliminal political commentary.

Crisply acted by Alma Poysti and Jussi Vatanem, Fallen Leaves beautifully charts a young couples event ridden courtship to their final walk into the sunset, while subtly highlighting issues of social connection, isolation, worker exploitation and addiction.

Colourful and deadpan with a distinctly Scandinavian sense of humour Fallen Leaves gets a film rating of 7.5 out of 10 and is highly recommended as a quirky love story about fate, films and falling in love.

If viewers love an art house romance, then catch Fallen Leaves on a streaming site. This Finnish film was a beautiful way to end of the 45^th Durban International Film Festival.

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