Steam of Life (Miesten vuoro)

This 2010 documentary hails from Finland and has got to be the first Finnish film I ever saw. Touching, but not forcibly so, "Steam of Life" presents 10+ vignettes of men divulging parts of their lives and themselves to one another, or sometimes to only the camera, in saunas ("sauna" can mean anything from telephone booth, to trailer, to an actual legitimate sauna establishment). The vignettes are interspersed with extraordinary images of rural Finland, thus creating a perfect rhythm for the film all while separating the stories so that the viewer can comfortably digest what he or she has just witnessed before moving on.

While "Steam of Life" is a seemingly simple, straightforward documentary, it is also an artfully made film. I loved the way the director envisioned and presented the sauna itself, as a space, as a catalyst for sharing. We see these burly men, large men, small men, soldiers, fathers, construction workers, brothers, and as they unrobe they're also baring their souls to the camera, to one another, to themselves. I was really pleasantly surprised at the quantity of nudity (no, not like that, you naughties) and the treatment of the naked body. While it is not at all central to the plot, the nudity in the film breaks the idea that nudity is bad, or forcibly sexual, or both. Though not every vignette is thematically heavy and dark, by telling a story, each man seems to unburden himself. In the midst of the storytelling process, he throws ladle after ladle of water upon the hot stones. The steam rises and evaporates, and with it, some of the man's pain.

Bravo, Finland.