Apr 16
International Film Forum: THE OTHER SIDE OF HOPE
The Other Side Of Hope (Aki Kaurismäki, Finland/Germany, 2017, 100 min.) – introduced by Bjorn Nordfjord, St Olaf
“This spare, puckish, yet ruefully clear-eyed comedic drama, directed by Aki Kaurismäki, is centered on the fate of Khaled (Sherwan Haji), a young man from Aleppo who arrives clandestinely in Helsinki and applies for asylum there. Kaurismäki’s calm and plain style is well suited to the step-by-step observation of the immigration system’s oppressively officious approach to Khaled and his fellow-applicants. Khaled’s story is told in parallel with that of a gruff, middle-aged salesman named Wikström (Sakari Kuosmanen), whose tale is a multilevel fantasy that starts with his brusque abandonment of his wife (Kaija Pakarinen) and continues on to his purchase of a restaurant after winning at high-stakes poker. When Khaled is denied asylum, he goes on the run. Wikström soon finds him hiding behind the restaurant’s garbage cans, takes him in, gives him a job, and selflessly helps him find his sister, Miriam (Niroz Haji), from whom he was separated in transit. Meanwhile, the ubiquitous presence of violent neo-Nazis tempers the good feelings. Running gags about oddball twists in the restaurant business serve little purpose but don’t detract from the movie’s essential quasi-documentary power” (Richard Brody, The New Yorker)