The Match Factory Girl (Tulitikkutehtaan tyttö) (1990)

This Finnish movie is certainly a film very few filmmakers would ever attempt. There is very little dialogue, the filmmaking and acting styles call little attention to the characters’ emotions, the movie is very slow paced, and there is often very little happening onscreen. Yet somehow this film is more fascinating to watch than many big budget action films. There is something odd and intriguing about this film that just can’t be explained. Somehow also there is also some very funny moments in this film. This is by no means an example of mainstream cinema, or traditional storytelling. It breaks every rule imaginable. Still it is one of the most powerfully effective movies I have ever seen.

Iris (Kate Outinen) works in a factory and lives with her mother and stepfather, neither of them showing her any love or affection. Everything and everyone around her is cold and unwelcoming as she just tries to make it by day by day, with everything seeming bleak and meaningless. One day she meets a man named Aarne (Vesa Vierikko). Iris thinks this man cares for her, but he thinks she is a prostitute. Aarne gets Iris pregnant. When Iris tries to convince him to help her raise the child he refuses. To tell you anything that takes place after this would be criminal.

Aki Kaurismäki is a fascinating director who it is safe to say makes films completely different from any other director. His movies are cold and avoid any sense of sentimentality. Still they manage to be unbelievably moving and fascinating. Despite their slow pace and that often little action appears on screen, his movies make it impossible to look away, because there is something intriguing that words cannot explain. With this said I view The Match Factory Girl as possibly his best movie. Again it is not easy to explain why an Aki Kaurismäki movie works, but this movie just holds something extra special for me. Maybe this is because of the main character. While in most of his films the characters show little emotion, this character seems to take it to a different more intriguing level. To watch her passively watch the harshness of her life through so much of this film is powerful that anything she could say through dialogue.

 Often times the emotional distance of Kaurismäki’s filmmaking causes us to come to our own conclusions about how we are supposed to emotionally react to what we are seeing. However I feel this is much more true here than in any other of his films. As we watch her passively watch her life get worse and worse, we are not sure whether to cry or laugh at what we are seeing. The movie gives us no clues as to what emotion we are supposed to have. It never has any scenes that are obvious tearjerkers and there is no broad comedy. This has sometimes been described as a dark comedy and if it is the director never lets us know he is joking, but he also never lets us know he isn’t joking. The director just lets the story unfold with brutal honesty and we decide how we are supposed to react to it. With all this uncertainty this movie is one of the most powerful movies I have ever seen, and despite me trying to critically analyze this movie here this is a film that must be watched to be felt.  

-Michael J. Ruhland