| Overview: | Cult Finnish filmmaker Aki Kaurismäki is internationally renowned for his distinctively spare and deadpan character studies of society's underdogs. This three-disc set contains his acclaimed "Workers' Trilogy", which finds Kaurismäki at the height of his sardonic humanist powers.
SHADOWS IN PARADISE
Finland (1986), 71 minutes
Kaurismäki regulars Matti Pellonpää and Katia Outinen star in this offbeat yet remarkably touching romantic comedy. Pellonpää plays Nikander, a rubbish collector and would-be entrepreneur who finds his plans for success dashed when his business associate commits suicide. Whilst searching for a job, he meets Ilona (Outinen) a down-on-her luck cashier in a local supermarket and, falteringly, a bond begins to develop between them.
ARIEL
Finland (1988), 69 minutes
Acclaimed as one of Kaurismäki's most accomplished early films, 'Ariel' follows the exploits of the laconic Taisto, a newly-unemployed Lapland miner who sets off in a Cadillac convertible for a fresh start in Helsinki. Joined in his odyssey by meter maid Irmeli and her young son, Taitso's plans take a series of unexpected turns in this dryly comic and satirical melange of road movie and film noir.
THE MATCH FACTORY GIRL
Finland (1990), 66 minutes
This blackly comic minimalist masterpiece stars Kati Outinen as Iiris, a shy and dowdy young woman stuck in a dead-end job on a match factory production line. She dreams of finding love at the local dancehall, but finds her attempts constantly foiled by her selfish parents and the callous behaviour of her would-be suitors. Finding herself pregnant after a one-night stand and abandoned by the father, Iiris finally decides the time has come to get even and she begins to plot her revenge.
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