Kaurismäkiis a Finnish producer, screenwriter and director. He has directed many diverse films, from road movies and film noir to (post)modern adaptations of literary works. Nevertheless, he has always maintained his own unique blend of irony laced with empathy and a sense of absurdity. He went to film school in Munich, and before founding the production and distribution company Villealfa (the name is an homage to Goddard’s film Alphaville) with his older brother Mika Kaurismaki, he worked as a postman, dishwasher, film critic… The first film produced by Villealfa was Liar (Valehtelija, 1981), directed by Mika and co written and starring Aki (in the role of Ville Alfa). In 1983, Aki made his first feature film, Crime and Punishment (Rikos ja rangaistus), the adaptation of Dostoyevsky’s novel. He made several other literary adaptations, such as Hamlet Goes Business (Hamlet liikemaailmassa, 1987), Bohemian Life (La vie de boheme, 1992) and Juha (1999). He is the founder of Leningrad Cowboys, (“the worst rock'n'roll band in the world”), and made two of his most famous films about them: Leningrad Cowboys Go to America (1989) and the sequel Leningrad Cowboys Meet Moses (1994). He made a documentary about their concert in Helsinki together with the Red Army’s dance ensemble Total Balalaika Show (1994). In his “proletariat trilogy”, consisting of Shadows in Paradise (Varjoja paratiisissa, 1986), Ariel (1988) and The Match Factory Girl (Tulitikkutehtaan tyttö, 1990), he deals with the working class’ problems. The last part of his career so far has been characterized by the “Finnish trilogy”: Drifting Clouds (Kauas pilvet karkaavat, 1996), The Man Without a Past (Mies vailla menneisyyttä, 2002) and Lights in the Dusk (Laitakaupungin valot, 2006), which is his last film to date. In all his films, Kaurismäki is the screenwriter and producer and Timo Salminen is almost always the director of photography.