Kamome shokudô (2006)

Kamome shokudô: Directed by Naoko Ogigami. With Satomi Kobayashi, Hairi Katagiri, Masako Motai, Jarkko Niemi. Where are we welcome? On a quiet street in Helsinki, Sachie has opened a diner featuring rice balls. For a month she has no customers. Then, in short order, she has her first customer, meets Midori, a gangly Japanese tourist, and invites her to stay with her, and meets Masako, a formal and ethereal middle-aged woman whose luggage has gone missing. The three women work in the diner, interact, and serve customers. A somewhat brusque man teaches Sachie to make delicious coffee, then he returns under other circumstances. Three neighborhood women inspect the empty diner every day; will anything bring them inside? We learn why Sachie serves rice balls; but why Finland?

“I found the film a bit boring and to tell the truth, fell asleep watching it on DVD a lazy Sunday afternoon.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eI found the acting especially by the young Finnish guy and the middle-aged Finnish woman less than convincing. Especially the u0026quot;Koskenkorvau0026quot; episode was a bit unrealistic, why would a woman who is depressed after losing her lover (or whatever the reason was) step into an empty diner, which doesnu0026#39;t at all look like it would even serve alcohol, and ask for a drink of vodka?u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eBut anyway, I just wanted to point out the careful selection of older and newer Finnish design classics used in the film. Aalto tables and chairs in the diner, the interiors of the Aalto-designed Academic Bookstore, Antti Nurmesniemiu0026#39;s coffee pots, the Hackman Tools series of pots and pans, Moomin books, and of course Marimekko clothes. Just to mention those I recognized before falling asleep.”