South Florida has a decent population of Finnish people. Those kids are always good for a laugh. Finland just sounds like a fun country to me with its arctic winters when the sun doesn’t rise and hot summers when the sun doesn’t set. Finland also tops Newsweek’s list of the best countries on earth.
I used to have a Finnish boss named Seppo. He was jittery and he talked funny but he always seemed to put a smile on my face. I had co-workers who had amazing Seppo impersonations. He was a weird dude but he also held several college degrees and spoke several languages. I’m telling you man don’t sleep on them Finns.
Apparently them kids are even capable of producing Hollywood-quality movies. Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale is the story of a little Finnish boy named Pietari and his encounter with Santa Claus. The Finnish version of Santa, however, is more monster than saint (huge devil horns give it away.) This is definitely not a movie for kids.
The story is completely ridiculous, involving things like slimy English-speaking businessmen with shady drilling operations and zombie-like old men armed with pick axes, but delivered serious in the style of magical realism (there are scenes that remind me of Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s brilliant short story “An Old Man with Very Enormous Wings.”) But really, I wouldn’t put it past Finland to have a supernatural Santa Claus buried under an ancient mountain. The Finnish language sounds like friggin Lord of the Rings elf-language, so you know those guys have some magic in them.
A creative writing teacher once explained to me that readers will accept the most ridiculous plot elements as long as the main character in the story is realistic and he/she experiences change throughout the course of the narrative. Good thing writer/director Jalmari Helander understands this foundation of character development so well. Little Pietari is hilarious running around scared in his brief underwear and with a rifle strapped to his back.
Pietari transforms from a timid weakling seeking his father’s approval to a daring warrior riding the outside of a helicopter as if it were a bucking bronco. The computer-generated special effects are a bit cheesy in that scene, but this almost adds to the charm of the movie. You have to appreciate a little cheese to appreciate this dark comedy.
Bottom-line, Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale is funny, suspenseful and original. Actor Onni Tommila shines as little gangsta Pietari. My Finnish brothers know what they are doing. I give this movie an A-.
There is one thing that bothers me. Out of the dozen or so Finnish kids I’ve met in my life, they have all been dudes. I have never ever seen a Finnish woman. There was not a single woman in the whole movie either. Where the ladies at Finland? Is it a shortage of females that makes you guys so quirky?
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