Cine Outsider header
Left bar Home button Disc reviews button Film review button Articles button Blogs button Interviews button Right bar
news archive
Older news stories have been archived by year and month, most recent first. They can be accessed by clicking on the links below.
2024 2023 2022
2021 2020 2019
2018 2017 2016
2015 2014 2013
2012 2011 2010
2009 2008 2007
2006 2005 2004
 
Man Without a Past in September

23 July 2009

The second installment of Aki Kaurismaki's (Drifting Clouds, Lights In The Dusk) 'Finland Trilogy', The Man Without A Past (Mies vailla menneisyyttä) is a touching and amusing film that portays a man who must start his life anew when he is brutally mugged and loses his memory.

On his arrival in Helsinki 'M' is mugged and set upon by thugs and is pronounced dead by doctors at the hospital. By some miracle however, he wakes up and walks out under his own power. Unable to remember his past, M is forced to rebuild his life from scratch. After a rocky start with a new family, he finds a new job and a new girlfriend. But it is not too long before the past inevitably catches up with him.

Aki Kaurismäki is one of Finland's most prolific filmmakers and without question its most internationally celebrated. Beginning his career directing the critically acclaimed The Liar with his older brother Mika, he went on to produce some of Finland's most famous international films, including the outstanding Leningrad Cowboys Go America.

Celebrated for its deadpan humour, Kaurismaki's The Man Without A Past is an honest and direct piece of cinema. Although quirky, incongruous and absurd, the film is full of genuine tenderness and understanding of the human desire for independence and true love, set against the bleak poverty of a broken Helsinki.

Hugely successful on its theatrical release, The Man Without A Past garenered more than 20 awards at international film festivals and a further 21 nominations including an Oscar in 2003. Previously released on UK DVD by Optimum, it will be re-released courtesy of ICA Films on 21st September 2009 at the RRP of £12.99.