''Nousukausi'', a.k.a. ''Upswing'', is a

2003 File:2003 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The crew of STS-107 perished when the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during reentry into Earth's atmosphere; SARS became an epidemic in China, and was a precursor to SARS-CoV-2; A des ...

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

black comedy Black comedy, also known as dark comedy, morbid humor, or gallows humor, is a style of comedy that makes light of subject matter that is generally considered taboo, particularly subjects that are normally considered serious or painful to discus ...

film A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...

. It is directed by

Johanna Vuoksenmaa Johanna Vuoksenmaa (born 21 September 1965) is a Finnish television and film director and screenwriter who has also worked as a photographer, installation artist and a teacher. Her films have been shown at numerous film festivals around the world ...

Story overview

A well-to-do, young professional urban couple desires an unusual, cutting-edge vacation and seek the help of a travel agent from Invisible Hand Tours. The couple begin their vacation as unemployed slum-dwellers while their manipulative travel agent makes off with everything they own. When the couple realizes they have been duped, they race to track down the con as their lives spiral out of control.

Plot

A dissatisfied

yuppie Yuppie, short for "young urban professional" or "young upwardly-mobile professional", is a term coined in the early 1980s for a young professional person working in a city. The term is first attested in 1980, when it was used as a fairly neu ...

couple in the IT business, with no kids and a fancy house in a prestige neighbourhood, have a few weeks off before the husband's new career challenges. Envious about their friends' exotic holiday destinations, the husband meets a

travel agent A travel agency is a private retailer or public service that provides travel and tourism-related services to the general public on behalf of accommodation or travel suppliers to offer different kinds of travelling packages for each destinatio ...

at a party, offering the ultimate experience: a one-month vacation under a false identity in

Jakomäki Jakomäki ( sv, Jakobacka) is a ''quarter'', part of Suurmetsä neighbourhood in Helsinki, Finland. It has an area of 1.92 km2 and a population of 5,481 (2005).http://www.hel2.fi/tietokeskus/helsinki_alueittain_2005/506Jakom%C3%A4ki.pdf 2005 ...

, a suburban block of flats in

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...

. Part of the deal is that their credit cards, house keys, phones, passports, and custom automobile are all traded in for a run-down council-housing apartment and four envelopes each with a weekly cash, equal to a standard unemployment allowance. Acting as an unemployed couple, their street credibility is often questioned by their new neighbours who are more at home with the ways of the concrete jungle. However, they discover after the first week that the second envelope is empty, and that the travel agency where they purchased their extreme vacation, does not exist.

External links

* 2003 films 2003 comedy-drama films Finnish comedy-drama films 2000s Finnish-language films Films directed by Johanna Vuoksenmaa {{Finland-film-stub