In Susanna Helke’s cleverly provocative and often very moving documentary, the beautifully hypnotic sound of Anna-Mari Kähärä’s music plays in poignant counterpoint to the words, comments and confessions posted by carers for the elderly in Finland between 2019 and 2021, and sung by a choir up of fellow, exhausted nurses.
Co-scripted by Helke and Markku Heikkinen, Ruthless Times: Songs of Care is not only a musical but a powerfully cinematic piece of activism, calling for better funding for the sector, less reliance on private companies building care facilities, greater appreciation for the nursing staff and ultimately – and perhaps most importantly – dignity for the frail and elderly in care.
The story of the current welfare system in Finland (where both the elderly and their caregivers undergo enormous challenges) is driven by individual stories – including that of nurse Tiina Mollberg, one of the first to highlight the problems in elderly care homes and subsequently blacklisted by her employer for speaking out. We also hear the stories of the elderly themselves, who worry about their future.
From call-centre care operations (run by the Kusti Goes Digi project in Helsinki) where staff video-call the elderly to chat, perform exercises with them and remind them to eat, through to a care robot that wouldn’t be out of place in a Pixar film, there are moments when the film veers into surreal and tragicomic moments, but despite the dark humour it never lingers on such easy targets, always heading back to ever bleaker reality instead.
The power of the film, though, lies in the moments when the beautiful music is played and the sad-faced choir members look bleakly at the camera. The lyrics are based on comments and statements from staff who felt they couldn’t communicate through formal channels for fear of losing their jobs.
Sometimes the lyrics are political – “We are a country of excessive debt…we are nibbling on borrowed currency” – but mainly sad and plaintive. “Many times I’ve had to stand and witness mistakes being made with medication…we weren’t allowed to tell their relatives that we are operating understaffed,” the choir sings at one point. Towards the end of the film the lyrics include the desperately sad line: “I am dead tired…dead tired..”
But most powerfully, there is deep-rooted sense that these workers, the ones at the bottom of the employment ladder but at the same time on the real front line and dealing with the realities of the failings of the care system, are also the ones who seem to care most. And their care and hard work is exhausting. “We are the shortfall of sustainability, we are the broad top of the upside-down pyramid,” they sing.
This clever, compassionate and moving film seems driven by sadness rather than anger, with director Susanna Helke delivering a work that both provokes and resonates. Everyone gets old and the right to age with dignity is the underlying and vital message of Ruthless Times: Songs of Care.
Finland, 2022, 92mins
Dir Susanna Helke
Production Road Movies Py
Screenplay Markku Heikkinen, Susanna Helke
Cinematography Sari Aaltonen
Editors Markus Leppälä, Inka Lahti, Samu Kuukka
Music Anna-Mari Kähärä
