This gentle biopic about the Finnish artist and writer Tove Jansson and her bohemian lifestyle narrows its focus to her 30s. A formative decade spanning 1944-54, it saw Jansson embark on two key romantic relationships, as well as creating the Moomins, the mischievous illustrated trolls that would make her name and her fortune (her paintings sold less well).
Alma Pöysti is luminous as Jansson, bringing to life her playful, pleasure-seeking artist’s spirit. Jansson’s affairs with leftist writer and politician Atos Wirtanen (Shanti Roney) and Vivica Bandler (Krista Kosonen), a married woman and “upper-class girl pretending to be a theatre director”, are revealing of her appetites and insecurities, as well the postwar mood.
