My second Aki Kaurismäki film, and I think I might have found my fave filmmaker of all time. His capability of making the ordinary, extraordinary all whilst juxtaposed with this bleak, infertile landscape is somewhat beyond genius.
I can only compare and contrast to Fallen Leaves as it’s the only other Kaurismäki film I’ve had to pleasure to fall in love with. Structurally, they are longingly similar, and that is not a bad thing. But there is this, cynical, ‘film-noir’ beat what permeates throughout Lights in the Dusk. It adds an extra dynamic, as a narrative device; I’m neither here nor there for it. Simple is better to some extent.
I’ve read a lot of reviews what describe his style as ‘minimalist’, and whilst to some extent I agree, it’s all about the subtext, the theme, the meaning and the intent for me. And the loneliness and isolation pours like honey from a hive. You want to live it, but you don’t. And that’s so many people’s lives out there. Being the final part of the ‘Loser Trilogy’, I fear that I’ve watched this out of sequence. And whilst Koistinen is a “loser” in every sense of the word, there this brilliant end of acceptance. And you can only move forward with acceptance.
It never glamourises, never even romanticises: it lays out the human condition as it comes, warts and all. With hurt, love, laughter, sorrow, yearning.
My second Aki Kaurismäki film, and I think I might have found my fave filmmaker of all time. His capability of making the ordinary, extraordinary all whilst juxtaposed with this bleak, infertile landscape is somewhat beyond genius.
I can only compare and contrast to Fallen Leaves as it’s the only other Kaurismäki film I’ve had to pleasure to fall in love with. Structurally, they are longingly similar, and that is not a bad thing. But there is this, cynical, ‘film-noir’ beat what permeates throughout Lights in the Dusk. It adds an extra dynamic, as a narrative device; I’m neither here nor there for it. Simple is better to some extent.
I’ve read a lot of reviews what describe his style as ‘minimalist’, and whilst to some extent I agree, it’s all about the subtext, the theme, the meaning and the intent for me. And the loneliness and isolation pours like honey from a hive. You want to live it, but you don’t. And that’s so many people’s lives out there. Being the final part of the ‘Loser Trilogy’, I fear that I’ve watched this out of sequence. And whilst Koistinen is a “loser” in every sense of the word, there this brilliant end of acceptance. And you can only move forward with acceptance.
It never glamourises, never even romanticises: it lays out the human condition as it comes, warts and all. With hurt, love, laughter, sorrow, yearning.
