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| Man Without a Past, The |
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  (9/10)
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Runtime: 97 |
| Public Rating: 6.11 (66 votes) |
Director: Aki Kaurismaki |
MPAA Rating:  |
| Genre: comedy/drama |
Year: 2003 |
| Writer(s): Aki Kaurismaki |
| Distributor: Sony Picture Classics (US), Sharmill Film (Aus) |
| Reviewed by: Avril Carruthers |
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Produced by Aki Kaurismäki
Starring Markku Peltola, Kati Outinen, Annikki Tähti, Juhani Niemelä, Kaija Pakarinen, Tähti-Dog, Sakari Kuosmanen, Marko Haavisto & Poutahaukat, Esko Nikkari, Outi Mäenpää, Perti Sveholm, Matti Wuori, Aino Seppo, Janne Hyytiäinen, Elina Salo, Anneli Sauli
“How do you find out who you are, but by what you love?”
Aki Kaurismaki is the Finnish director who gave us the absurd Leningrad Cowboys Go America in 1989 – a self-judged bad film that has nevertheless been followed by some more deftly helmed but offbeat drama/comedies. The Man Without a Past has been justifiably widely acclaimed. It has all Kaurismaki’s usual concerns with class disparity and bureaucratic ineptitude as well as his trademark wry, dry humour and understated acting, which paradoxically, are light in effect.
The main character’s name is a mystery until well into the movie and in the credits is simply named M (Markku Peltola). By his clothes he’s an industrial worker of some kind and his overnight train journey lands him in Helsinki at 4am. Sleeping sitting up on a park bench with his head on his suitcase, he is savagely beaten by three thugs armed with a baseball bat. They take his wallet and leave him for dead, his welder’s helmet over his face and his suitcase contents spread around.
In hospital, swathed in bandages and hooked up to heart monitor etc, he flat lines and the hospital staff also leave him for dead. Without identification there is no one they can notify. Surprisingly he comes back from the dead, and the decisive crunch as he straightens his broken nose almost eclipses what we later realise is a significant rebirth. Unnoticed, he leaves the hospital and after collapsing near a canal is taken in by a destitute man Nieminen (Juhani Niemelä) and his wife (Kaija Pakarinen) and two boys living in a derelict container in a coal yard.
M has no memory of who he is and though the residents of the makeshift Container Town accept him without question or condition they are not unaware of the bleakness of his situation. Without identification he can be refused employment and imprisoned for vagrancy.
The people of Container Town are not completely derelict. An ingenious makeshift outdoor shower, fed by buckets of heated water results in M’s host Nieminen looking quite respectable. “It’s Friday night,” he says, “Let’s go out for dinner.” The local Salvation Army soup kitchen is as appropriate a place as any other to celebrate survival, on any level.
There, M meets Irma (Kati Outinen) in an electric, silent first meeting. The encounter leads to a whole other life for M and eventually to the slowly, imperfectly returning memory of his mysterious past.
There are many things to fascinate in this movie. One is the universally dour and minimalist acting style that Kaurismaki favours. Everything is conveyed by the eyes and by wide angled shots that show body language. Kati Outinen’s still depth is shown transparently in her face – at least when she knows what she is thinking, while Markku Peltola’s wooden face, being more opaque, makes us find our own meaning there. He is a bit of an Everyman.
The few Finns I know are volatile and expressive. This stylised stoicism portrayed by the entire Finnish cast is so effortlessly held it produces an unexpected exuberance in the viewer. This is never more evident than when M has secured his own container (after the previous resident froze to death). He is paying a fortune in rent to the rapacious security guard Anttila (Sakari Kuosmanen) and with Nieminen engages the help of a nameless electrician (who freely gives his services in hooking up the container to the nearby light pole) to connect the jukebox M has salvaged from the dump. The jukebox plays the blues, the three men merely sit to share a scratch meal. Though they don’t express the slightest joy, you can feel it nevertheless.
Another fascination is in how M discovers who he is – not his name – but his true nature and his values. It’s a gradual thing. If you don’t know who you are, how do you go about finding that from the inside but by what you are attracted to? What if you are a murderer on the run?
M knows he loves music and Irma. He loves Hannibal, the dog he inherits (the most expressive member of the cast, awarded the Palme D’Og at Cannes). He knows how to plant potatoes. He is a bit of an entrepreneur with the Salvation Army band and brings them together, along with the Flea Market manageress (real life Finnish singer Annikki Tähti), with the jukebox to increase their repertoire. He discovers he knows how to weld and that leads to his seeking an official job, though he has been working for the Salvation Army for a pittance. He still has no ID, and is told all he needs is a bank account for his pay. To get a bank account he needs ID. At the bank, an armed hold up disrupts his plans and he ends up in jail, arrested because he has no ID.
The absurdity of the entire situation is highlighted by everyone’s lack of reaction. With a few exceptions, the people of this world seem to accept everything without question, as we do in a dream. And yet Kaurismaki’s passionate concern for the downtrodden is shown in the care they give each other, while those with power are shown as violent, coldly manipulative and exploitive.
Befitting its subject matter the movie is shot in cold grey colours, often dark and grimy. Cinematographer Timo Salminen, who has filmed all of Kaurismaki’s films, has a knack for allowing us to find the humour and irony, as well as the power, in each shot.
The end of the movie is unexpectedly one in which a sense of solidarity in a community which knows its strength is affirmed. It’s a film of serendipitous beauty.
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