Aurora

A film about refuges. In many senses, in many forms. Seductive for the inspired performances, for humor, melancholia , maybe not exactly for the end. A clash between cultures and a romance seeming not the familiar one. A film about sense of life of an Iranian refugee in Finland, for a young woman looking for help the others for ignore herself. Maybe not great but very nice. As a sort of polite interogation about the viewer perspective about the other.

Really enjoyable film. Rovaniemi, the small Arctic city is one of the stars of the show. The 2 main characters are a self destructive, gobby Finnish girl who is initially hard to warm to and a troubled refugee and his daughter. Secondary characters are a lovely Finnish social worker and her black, Finnish husband. His ethnicity provides a comedy sub plot which is funny, awkward and very Finnish. He provides most of the laughs and I've seen him in Heavy Trip where he displays similar excellent, if brutal, comic timing. Get through the unlikeable first 20 minutes and get to the point where you will be really rooting for Aurora, who starts out as an unlikeable human disaster zone. Quite a lot of English but mostly in Finnish language.

It's a very well produced piece though it rather lacks realism. Whatever misfortunes Aurora brings on herself, or which befall her, there always seems to be a safety net so there's no lasting damage. It's perhaps more fairytale than comedy. I thought that the last few minutes took the fairytale too far and spoilt it for me so I knocked off a star for that. Some parts were more silly than funny. And some of the hardship was rather contrived. But, great acting and some good ideas. A curate's egg!