Fallen Leaves

Straight out of a depressing Helsinki suburb, Fallen Leaves is an unlikely rom-com about two worn-out zero-hour contract workers who find each other at the bar. Despite their bleak and grey lives, Ansa and Holappa find solace in each other’s loneliness and embark on an awkward 80 minutes of drinking too much, adopting a homeless dog (Snoop from Anatomy of a Fall might rightly be everyone’s dog of the year but Chaplin is not to be sniffed at) and going to the cinema. If you like the eccentric films of Jim Jarmusch then you will love this quirky, award-winning little film where love seems possible even at the dead-end of life; instead of wallowing, these characters laugh and make music and stay true to themselves. And where better than a 1960s lecture theatre to experience such uplifting joy?

Daniel Kallin