Fallen Leaves

Aki Kaurismäki's Fallen Leaves (Kuolleet lehdet) won the Jury Prize at Cannes 2023 and the César for Best Foreign Film. The film extended Kaurismäki's loose Proletariat trilogy that had begun with Shadows in Paradise (1986) and Ariel (1988); Kaurismäki had announced retirement before this project, then returned. The film is Finland's official Oscar submission and was widely received as one of the most-loved European art-films of the year.

Two solitary Helsinki workers (Ansa (Alma Pöysti), a supermarket cashier fired for taking home food past its sell-by date, and Holappa (Jussi Vatanen), an unemployed man with a drinking problem) meet by chance one night at a karaoke bar and feel the faint pull of mutual interest. The film follows the slow, embarrassed, repeatedly interrupted attempt of these two unobtrusive people to start a relationship, against the backdrop of news reports from the Russian invasion of Ukraine playing on every cafeteria radio across the city.

The film operates in Kaurismäki's signature register, long static shots, deadpan dialogue, working-class Helsinki interiors, an almost-stationary 1960s-1970s aesthetic. Timo Salminen's photography is among the most distinctive in European cinema; Kaurismäki's regular ensemble of bartenders, dog actors and supporting performers anchors the film. Pöysti's central performance is one of the most quietly affecting Finnish-language leads in recent memory; the film became the rare Cannes-competition production that genuinely earned the audience prize for charm.