The Man Without a Past

The message, if there must be one, of this marvelous, stubbornly personal movie is that there is a spark in every soul.

Enormously satisfying, superbly crafted.

The revered Finnish director Aki Kaurismäki has hit on a way to give you grim social realism and movie-ish sentimentality in one fell swoop.

Simply enjoy its witty and expertly crafted scenes, its controlled performances, its eccentric but mostly admirable characters, its succession of bleak but cozily Nordic panoramas and its surprisingly optimistic view of the world.

It's a gentle, surprising little movie whose rewards lie in what its characters don't say as much as in what they do.

The Man Without a Past has the slenderness of a folk-tale -- also the clarity and charm.

I suspect that, like the Coen brothers, David Lynch, and Wes Anderson -– our American masters of idiosyncrasy -– Kaurismäki has a limited appeal. Those who get him, really get him.