Das Mädchen aus der Streichholzfabrik (1990)

Das Mädchen aus der Streichholzfabrik: Directed by Aki Kaurismäki. With Kati Outinen, Elina Salo, Esko Nikkari, Vesa Vierikko. A woman’s terribly dull life is upended by a one-night stand pregnancy, causing her to seek retribution.

“Iris is a young Finnish girl whose life has no horizon. She works in a match factory and still lives at her parentsu0026#39;. She escapes by reading soppy love stories or by attending a dance. One night, she thinks she has found Prince Charming. But the latter reveals himself a scornful human being who has no consideration for her. Then, she is chased away by her parents and relies on her brotheru0026#39;s generosity to put her up. But Iris didnu0026#39;t say her last word and she decides to prepare a plan to have a revenge on the ones who couldnu0026#39;t love her.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eIn the nineteenth Century, Andersen, a Danish writer wrote a tale entitled u0026quot;the little match girlu0026quot;. Here, the film-maker Aki Kaurismäki kept certain elements of this tale to create in his own way, a sort of updated version. And itu0026#39;s a much more austere one so much that it virtually evokes Robert Bressonu0026#39;s cinema. This is how I perceive u0026quot;the Match Factory Girlu0026quot; (1990): a cross between a modernized version of Andersenu0026#39;s tale and Bressonu0026#39;s cinema for the straight-forward style and the intense austerity in which the story bathes.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eAki Kaurismäki seems to have understood that to give his movie a big dramatic intensity, ostentation and exaggeration were to be excluded. The amount? A grievous movie which hurts where everything in the cinema writing is reduced to simplicity, nearly stillness and despair. This, to better express the dreary world in which Iris is prisoner and the wrong hopes she comes up against. Barely camera movements (the movie nearly looks like a succession of paintings), sinister scenery, blue-green lighting, dumb or merciless characters blend themselves to create a universe impenetrable to happiness. To plunge more in this desolate world, Kaurismäki nearly shot a silent movie, only scattered by laconic and reduced in the extreme dialogs. But to tell the truth, dialogs are not the most important thing. Looks matter more and reveal best the charactersu0026#39; thoughts and feelings.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe directoru0026#39;s sympathy towards Iris and making her put up at her brotheru0026#39;s are the only pities he shows and his movie would be of a total blackness if there wasnu0026#39;t humor. A humor which acts in an ironic way: u0026quot;I came to tell you goodbye…u0026quot;.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eOverrall, this grave movie about the lack of love strikes right at the heart and its vision is rather difficult. If you are down in the dumps, save it for a better day. Itu0026#39;s a short movie (hardly an hour) but Irisu0026#39; pale and retiring countenance stays rooted for a long time in the spectatoru0026#39;s brain. And Kati Outinen, impressive of fragility and sensitiveness is perfect in this role.”