Taisto is a newly unemployed Lapland miner who sets off in a convertible Cadillac for a fresh start in Helsinki. Joined in his odyssey by parking attendant Irmeli and her young son, Taitso’s plans take a series of unexpected turns when he gets framed for a crime he didn’t commit.

A romantic road movie that has little time for traditional notions of love and happiness, this second part of the Proletariat Trilogy finds Kaurismäki taking his first leap into genre territory. Fit to burst with existential yearning, Ariel is a ruthlessly unsentimental tale of escape and survival.