Review by Vinoo
Language : Finnish / Swedish
Director : Klaus Haro
During the Second World War, Finnish children were sent to neutral Sweden to surrogate homes where they were safe from enemy attack. Eero’s father is killed in the Winter War* and his mother, Kirsti Lahti, has not much choice but to let him be taken to a new home in Sweden. While Hjalmar Jonsson, the surrogate father accepts Eero willingly his wife, Signe Jonsson (a brilliant performance by Maria Lundqvist) at first rejects him altogether and gives him much pain. We quickly realize that there is something much deeper to her attitude. Signe has lost her six-year old daughter very recently. Signe was expecting a young girl to come home and Eero is the unexpected kid they are sent. She gradually comes to terms with the fact that her daughter who drowned in the sea will never come back. From Kirsti’s letters she also gathers that she has since moved to Helsinki and has taken a German lover. Kirsti wants Eero to stay on with his new family. The bond between Signe and Eero starts getting stronger as Signe now feels he is her own son and she will never have to part with him when the war is over. Eero slowly starts to develop a hatred for his biological mother, Kirsti and a bond with her new mother, Signe. He is forced to go back to Finland when the war is over. The entire story is told in flashback when Eero goes to visit Kirsti and gets a letter from Sweden. Signe has passed away and it is during the funeral that Eero figures that he was wrong in being detached from Kirsti. All that Kirsti and Signe wanted for him was what was best for him. Important questions are raised on who really is a parent. Is there anything biological about a parent? Well… I will let you ponder over that one. The film has brilliant performances by the entire cast. Eero played by Topi Majaneimi plays his role of the kid, stuck between his two mother’s and the fear of being abandoned one day, to perfection.
The whole idea of sending kids to surrogate homes during the war must have been a psychological nightmare not just the kid but for the parents too. The trauma that each one goes through has been brilliantly portrayed in ‘Aideista Parhain’.
The film has brilliant cinematography by Jarkko T Laine, who has also shot ‘Elina’ and ‘The new man’. Hope to access other films by the director, Klaus Haro, ‘The new man’, ‘Elina, As if I didn’t exist’, ‘Letters to Father Jacob’, etc.
Caught ‘Biutiful’ (that’s how Javier Bardem spells it ‘you spell it like it sounds, dear’)for Bardem rather than Inarritu, ‘Certified Copy’(Abbas Kiarostami), ‘Elektra’ (Shyama Prasad), ‘Somewhere’ (Sofia Coppola) etc etc. ‘Black Heaven’ and ‘Wine ‘my pick so far. ‘Veetilekkulla Vazhi’ (Dr.Biju) was pretty good.
Useless trivia : Based on a book by Heikki Heitamies, ‘Aideista parhain’ was nominated to the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film at the 78th Academy Awards. The story could have been inspired from real life as Heikki Heitamies, a ‘war-child’, was evacuated from Finland to Skane, Sweden. Kudos to the director for translating that feeling onto screen.
* The Winter War was a 105-day war between the Soviet Union and Finland. Although the Soviet Union had forces and ammunition almost 30 times more than Finland had access to, Finland held on longer than expected and came away with their head held high. (Courtesy : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_War). During the war some countries remained neutral, Sweden being one of them. Reminds me of a ‘Hagar’ cartoon strip, about Switzerland though.
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