Fallen Leaves

Kaurismäki is the master of deadpan tragicomedy. A lot of great laughs and deep sadness, mixed with impeccable framing. That one electropop duo were based

Aki Kaurismäki is back with a romcom. Mind you, a romcom very much in his mould, ie grumpy, slow, and somehow set in the 70s despite being set in the autumn of 2024. But the collision between the working-class romcom plot and Kaurismäki's taciturn style creates something very special. And very funny. There are dark bits here, but he balances it perfectly with some knowing nods to other movies, and with a genuine warm, if dark, humour. And when Alma Pöysti cracks a rare smile, the world changes.

Made me realize I'm totally done with Wes Anderson.

“Don’t go yet. Coma patients can wait for five minutes or more.” Maybe my favorite Kaurismaki. So beautiful and restrained. Warm and inviting, but darkly funny. The textures, the sounds, the music, and performances - he’s at his absolute best here.

Now this is my favorite type of romcom (by the way, Bill Murray and Adam Driver are in the film... not joking)

It's impossible to argue the glowing reviews saying, "It shows that even in the bleakness of our world, there is love and light," but the darkness and light of this film are within a mere few lumens of each other in delivery; the patient and gentle romance, in its deadpan subtlety, just failed to connect with me.

Two lives like leaves just barely hanging on in a timeless concrete capitalist world (the niche slice of blue collar life snapshots, beautifully filmed, are endlessly compelling), subject to the winds of chance, yes (see the lost number), but also with the real power of choice (see her kicking him out, him kicking his addiction). Life can hit you like a train but quirky friends, cute dogs, and music that speaks (to) what your soul is feeling (see the emo pop duo at the bar) offer winks of hope.

all you need is love, and good public services

So much a throwback to 80s-90s Kaurismaki that every time the camera panned to the leads I half expected to see the faces of young Kati Outinen and Matti Pellonpää. There's a deliberate disregard for time period: The Ukraine War is on the (very old) radio, but a plethora of movie references, including old posters, range between (I believe) 1951-1983 (Bresson, who is mentioned by name, has to he a major influence on Kaurismaki) and there's a rotary phone in one scene. Features an adorable dog.

Me, the Wes Anderson fan™ : “This has a Wes Anderson vi- *gets shot*. Charming, melancholic, funny; I just love broken people finding love

Beautifully shot, super funny and ridiculously cute. The performances were great and so was the script.

One of those comedies that feel brutal and genuinely funny at the same time. Simple working-class people facing everyday hardships -- getting fired, having to find another job, dealing with drinking problems, finding a hard time to fall in love with someone -- while trying, but not too hard, to build a relationship. Gotta love the batshit weird setting. It feels 70s, but it's 2024. News on the radio about the Russian-Ukrayne war, but no cellphones or internet. Lovely dog.

This might be K's most cross-referential and personal film yet as he narrates a working-class, no BS love story with references to Bresson, Jim Jarmusch, and Chaplin. His visual austerity and deadpan gesture captures an everyday poetry that serves to claim both that there can be beauty and love in poverty, but also that in our fallen capitalist world, love and poetry can only survive ironically (hence deadpan and dark humor). One of the best of 23 for me.

ilk buluşmada ilk akşam yemeğinin ilk dakikalarında ilk kadehi fondip yapıp alkolün devamı nerde aq diye evi terk etmeli bir date.....

calling in hit by a train next monday to skip work

It felt like i was back in the early 2000s when arthouse comedies were often like this: apathetic people, music acts with people standing still like statues, constant non sequiturs in the dialog, a droll love story between broken people, a sort of whimsical absurdism that is actually mostly appealing to normies. Very unoriginal and never ever funny to me, not even a little bit. I wish i had something less grouchy to say

2024'de #IzlediğimFilmler ; 14. Kuolleet lehdet (2023) Aki Kaurismaki sevdiğimiz yönetmenlerden, ruh halimden de kaynaklanıyor olabilir, bu filmi beni içerisine bir türlü alamadı. 4/10

galiba içinde birkaç baretli adam ve iş makinası olduğu için sevmemiz beklenen bir film bu.

Essentially Buffalo '66 at 0.5x speed.

I like the strange atmosphere of the movie. The only reference telling us that this takes place nowadays is the Russia-Ukraine war on the radio. The rest of the movie feels like it takes place in Soviet Russia in the 60s. A pretty simple but fun and engaging story. However, it somehow still falls flat and doesn't really leave me very impressed.

büyüksün kaurismaki. bıktım süslü püslü filmlerden en iyisi böylesi

Ansa: "My father died of drink. So did my brother. My mother died of grief. I like you a lot, but I won’t take a drunk."

Social isolation. Quiet despair.. Hope. New beginnings. Those are the themes of this quiet, unassuming film. Then there are ominous radio reports of the war in Ukraine creating unease.

Other than Leningrad Cowboys and La Vie de Boheme it seems like Kaurismaki makes the same movie every single time yet they are all still worth watching

Her işte önüne gelen engellerden dolayı dikiş tutamayan çiftimiz, gittiği karaoke bar'da elektriklenme olur. Her buluştuklarında birbirlerini seven çiftimiz, çalıştığı işlerde tutunamadığı gibi aşk da sorunlar yaşar. İlk seyrettiğimde fenalık geçirdim. Hatta sinema da yan koltuktaki seyirci uyuyup başını da omuzuma koyunca gülmüştüm. Film ağır tempo ilerliyor. Kurgu hareketli olsa başyapıttı. Filmin sonunda, senin sevmesem almam seni hastaneden. Valla mı? Seviyorum işte var mı diyeceğin? Gerçek.

A dry and droll spin on rom-com tropes from Kaurismäki - this feels like BRIEF ENCOUNTER by way of WHEN HARRY MET SALLY at times, though Pöysti and Vatanen are such dour and inscrutable leads, it sometimes feels like Kaurismäki is being sadistically witholding, especially when we get an overt riff on the climax of AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER that follows it to its brutal aftermath! Too low-key and cold to be a complete success, but I'll certainly be thinking about it and chuckling in the coming days!

A lovely small cute movie on normal people's normal romance. On an unrelated note, it was good to be reminded of how close Finland is to Russia.

deadpan at its most genuine

My first Kaurismäki. The off-kilter acting and the occasional obvious blocking threw me off but things became clearer over time. The humor started to land with the two cinephiles dropping references and then splitting. The stilted style made me unsure whether scenes were supposed to be funny or dramatic, like the tram incident. Kaurismäki’s use of Ukraine reporting I think is supposed to show how difficult it is to see outside oneself when in the throes of poverty.

love and cinema ain't dead

Not as bad as the score I've given. Pretty compelling but slow. Did anything really happen?

Kaurismäki's style felt a bit forced this time at first, but it grew on me. Loved the anachronism. Funny, witty, career-encompassing.

Understated played very straight-but full of detail and human moments.

Charming film, but somewhat slight. A product of a filmmaker with firm control of his aesthetic.

Archetypically this is my kind of film but there just wasn't enough meat on the bone. Parts of it kind of felt like Bela Tarr doing a romcom and I liked all of the music.

Loved will show up even in the most miserable settings. (Loved the bitter humour in this one!)

A movie so wispy that it basically evaporates as you’re watching it. Low-key to simultaneously admirable and apathetic ends, this is quiet and twee in a way that I never found less than dully pleasant, but I also scarcely ever found it more than that.

Mubi