Cannes review: “The Woodcutter Story” by Mikko Myllylahti

There’s kind of a Finnish movie checklist, and I mean it with love, that includes a snowy exterior, a hard, sharp interior, ice fishing, and killing someone with an ax. A history of wood cutting Check all the boxes and a few more. Characters who can barely speak, for example, and can’t really have anything to say. When they do, there’s a tantalizing sense of humor that may not be tantalizing at all – their dead delivery produces nothing. This is the Finnish way.

Director / Writer Mikko Myllylahti – Poet who also wrote the screenplay for Juho Kuosmanen Happiest day in Ollie Mack’s life, which won the first prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 2016, fixes the title of Cannes Critics’ Week in an unnamed village in the far north of Finland, surrounded by a timber factory. Myllylahti’s protagonist, Pepe, is a woodcutter played by the same actor who gave Olli Mack so much humanity, Jarko Laht.

Pepe is a sparkly innocent, everyone’s favorite. When we met, he was in a village bar, where everyone gathered for his birthday and, to his great surprise, they collected a large sum of money as a gift. He immediately declares that the drinks are at his expense. Pepe is kind; He is never angry; He is cheerful and it turns out that he can escape any trouble with him good humor of him.

There is nothing to do on an endless Scandinavian night when there are no birthdays: the villagers get together to play cards, ice fish or, as we find out, have fun with less likely sex. When the so-called “psychic singer” brings his touring show to town and insists he can reach the dead, everyone shows up. This is a distraction. The absurdity of existence can also shed some light on what men argue in the bar when they talk. “The life we ​​live is important to us, but it’s just an illusion,” said one. “It’s scary to think that nothing matters.” This is a social comedy written by Kierkegaard.

A history of wood cutting Also deeply melancholy, bizarre and surreal. A sphere of light can appear out of nowhere and suddenly explode, taking Pepe’s son with it. The car that fell in the fire is inexplicably driving down the street. We have the sparks of a mysterious crushed beast. And who are the heroes who, with spectacular but confusing prefaces, discuss a torrent of misfortunes already imposed on the inhabitants of this worthy country in a shack in a mountain refuge, who obviously do not deserve it? They might be gods, although not the usual Scandinavian type, given the bag they carry.

Trouble is falling on the villagers. The sawmill closes abruptly, leaving everyone unemployed and Pepe’s best friend Tuoma desperate. There are corpses, including the aforementioned ax murder. Pepe takes the worst, but like an optimistic elf, he continues in his dazzling red and white ski suit, the only strong color in the film dominated by the shadows of the snow. Millati said he based Pepe on a real person. Character stamina is his main theme, however, you have to assume that the nonsense of existence comes second.

You can also feel the spirit of guidance from Finnish master Aki Kaurismac. A history of wood cuttingWith the perfumes of Buñuel’s surrealism. However, it is less extensive than Kaurismac’s recent films – despite very large and spectacular images of frozen mountains and lakes – with less human capabilities. There are many stories, but there are sections where these twists fall into a kind of homogeneity, as if one strange path followed another. And inexplicable quirks don’t always apply to this company’s history, even if the strangest, an undisclosed ending, is suddenly satisfying. But most of all I love the courage of the gentleman Milliht. He saw a clear and particular story and left. He is a watchmaker.