Cold war, hot sauna

With his third feature History Is Made at Night Ilkka Jarvilaturi solidifies his position as Finland's most interesting director. With its menacing family drama his first film Homebound (1989) jimmied the expectations to the roof. Darkness in Tallinn (1993) shot through it with its great combination of black humor, action and Estonia. And Jarvilaturi's latest, most expensive and most international film does not drop the basket.

Instead History Is Made at Night that from the local perspective cost a ton, internationally peanuts, sits onto the sauna bench a stark naked Bill Pullman to give a brisk birch branch beating to Irčne Jacob who genuinely enjoys her bath. If this film doesn't end the pointless complaints about the damage caused to the nation by its movies, then nothing will.

Before this scene, Bill Pullman was best remembered as the president of the United States in Roland Emmerich's mega movie Independence Day (1996), Irčne Jacob as Veronique from Krzysztof Kieslowki's Double Life of Veronique (1991) and as Valentina in Three Colors: Red (1994).

In History Is Made at Night Bill Pullman is Harry, a CIA agent stationed in Helsinki and fed up with espionage as the end of the cold war has ended. He would like to focus on his cover role running a jazz-club, and to his love, Natasha, played by Irčne Jacob. He knows that Natasha is from CIA's opposing camp, the Russian SVR. She also knows about Harry's real job. They have an unvoiced agreement about not letting the other's spying disturb the family peace.

Our couple's northern harmony shatters when a video tape containing stolen satellite secrets for the Russians arrives from New York to Helsinki. With it comes a tech-head CIA agent (Glenn Plummer), an opportunist stock broker that's been coalesced to become a courier (Bruno Kirby) and a crew of Kalashnikov-toting SVR-goons stylishly lead by Udo Kier, a veteran of over 90 films with a cult following around the world.

As fast as the cold war temperature chills to its original levels, Harry and Natasha's relationship gets hot and tangled - as do the geo-synchronous orbits of satellites.

Jarvilaturi's movie delivers again on its black humor and devilish dialogue. A Z-class porn flick has been shot onto the videotape that everybody covets. Henry Saari's performance at the lead role does not fall an inch short of his previous feats. Pullman is again excellent as the American with an identity crises. Jacob as his pair is a bit more Barbie-like.

History Is Made at Night is as much a spy-adventure, relationship movie and a comedy, and none specifically. Whatever the genre, most charming about the film is its disarming playfulness. Almost as Lubitsch himself would have reached out his hand from heavens and touched the movie.