Quentin Tarantino is supposedly going to retire from filmmaking following his tenth feature film, which is now in pre-production.  For those viewers who seek to find another like him, I hereby recommend Finnish writer-director Jalmari Helander, whose latest film is a World War II opus with a similar style to that of Inglorious Basterds, at least in terms of war gore, grotesque imagery, ironic and laconic dialogue, bleakness of vision and ultra-wackiness of dramatic plotting.  I know Helander from a thriller he made a few years ago, Big Game, a truly nutzoid thriller involving the downing of Air Force One in Europe and the efforts to save the U. S. President (Samuel L. Jackson).  Sounds good, perhaps?  No, it isn’t.  Thankfully, in just about every way, Sisu is better.

Jalmari Helander’s tale takes place in rural Finland as World War II is drawing to a close.  German troops have overrun the country and destroyed nearly everything.  Prospector Aatami (Jorma Tommila) is unaware, because he has been digging up gold far into the uplands.  Fully packed with the treasure, Aatami makes his way toward a city, encountering a small German force.  His secret stash revealed, the Nazis try to take it from him and he resists.  This involves lots of explosions, a tank, a plane, several female prisoners, a horse and a dog, and absolutely brutal conditions of warfare.  You can guess who survives.

Sisu begins rather realistically, although nothing in its story is true to actual history.  This is myth-making on a personally grand scale, as the nasty Nazis try to bully the prospector out of his hard-won nuggets of gold, even after they are told that he is a Finnish legend, a commando who has personally killed at least three hundred Russians earlier in the war.  The action ramps up as Aatami survives shootings, stabbings, hanging and, most ridiculously, even a plane crash.  These adventures are stylishly photographed, sometimes in slow motion, so that every near-death experience can be appreciated in full.  As he proved with Big Game, Helander is not concerned with being too outlandish or brutally provocative.

To a surprising degree, this formula works.  There are certainly (too many) moments where borders of believability are crossed, but when the action is somewhat restrained, it is harshly and effectively presented.  Jorma Tommila presents an authentically rough and tough persona as Aatami, sort of a battle-scarred, never-quitting Sterling Hayden type.  Aksel Hennie, as Bruno, the Nazi leader, is just as good, and the rest of the small cast acquit themselves admirably as well.  It’s easy to root for Aatami, who almost never speaks, as he simply tries to cash in on what he has so painfully dug out of the ground, and the Nazis are easy to hate.  It’s a well-structured underdog tale, but be advised that it is bloodier and bleaker than most of these types of war adventures, Tarantino’s included.  For all that, it’s a decent little movie, if a bit hard to swallow at times.  ☆ ☆ 1/2.  28 November 2023.