Aki Kaurismaki's Proletariat Trilogy (Criterion Collection)

The poignant, deadpan films of Aki Kaurismaki are pitched somewhere in the wintry nether lands between comedy and tragedy. And rarely in his body of work has the line separating those genres seemed thinner than in what is often identified as his "Proletariat Trilogy," Shadows in Paradise, Ariel, and the Match Factory Girl. In these three films, something like social-realist farces, Kaurismaki surveys the working-class outcasts of his native Finland with detached yet disarming amusement. Featuring commanding, off-key visual compositions and delightfully dour performances, the films in this triptych exemplify the talents of a unique and highly influential film artist.