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Tom of Finland

Play trailer 2:13 Poster for Tom of Finland 2017 1h 56m Biography History Drama LGBTQ+ Play Trailer Watchlist
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83% Tomatometer 69 Reviews 70% Popcornmeter 500+ Ratings
Finnish artist Touko Laaksonen becomes famous for his homoerotic works.
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Tom of Finland

Tom of Finland

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Critics Consensus

Tom of Finland honors its subject with an empathetic, even-handed, and above all entertaining look at the pioneering art he produced from private turmoil.

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Critics Reviews

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Ben Sachs Chicago Reader 04/10/2020
Director Dome Karukoski brings an oddly tasteful approach... But once Laaksonen achieves success and finds domestic happiness with a ballet dancer, the filmmakers don't have much to say about their subject. Go to Full Review
Ty Burr Boston Globe 12/14/2017
2.5/4
In a subtle but wily performance, Strang never loses sight of his character's innate sense of resistance. Go to Full Review
Kristen Page-Kirby Washington Post 12/07/2017
3/4
In the end, the overarching theme of "Tom of Finland" is the power of art, even - or maybe especially - so-called deviant art. Go to Full Review
Sarah Vincent Cambridge Day 08/16/2023
The ghost of war and trauma became muses cheering on his satirical fetish art, which transformed threatening tormentors into a beckoning aesthetic ideal with plenty of biker beefcakes and overly uniformed men of authority. Go to Full Review
Ben Turner The Pink Lens 09/02/2021
3/5
The film is unable to find its stride by playing it safe for 90% of its time on screen, with the remaining 10% going off on a wild tangent that looks like an advert for Piz Buin. Go to Full Review
Richard Propes TheIndependentCritic.com 09/26/2020
3.0/4.0
It's a good film, occasionally a very good film, but it never really soars like this story should soar. Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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Daniel O 11/21/2023 Based on real events. But need to focus better on his life no in the drawnings See more Roger S 06/14/2023 An immersive movie, very understated but never felt slow. Tom of Finland has a compusive story, and is an excellent reference point to gain insight into both pre- and post- WW2 gay society. The (mostly) restrained acting feels true to it's bio-pic ethos and given the huge scope of the film from his early life in the army during WW2 right through to his mainstream acceptance as an artist in the States, it never seems to get bogged down. I've watched it twice with friends and it's really worth trying. See more 12/04/2022 Albeit it's a sketchy portrayal of the notorious titular protagonist's psyche, this Finnish entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 90th Academy Awards is nevertheless a stirring autobiography of Touko Laaksonen whose sketches of leather-clad homoerotic masculinization nurtured the 20th century gay culture. See more 08/29/2020 this one played like a PBS biography special with disconnected moments (what happened in America) + too many disjointed themes and characters that never really pulled it off.... See more 07/12/2020 The fascinating and unforeseeable trajectory of this true story and its central figure was unbeknown to me and consistently drew interest to the film as a result, despite the alternating and confusing shifts in timeline throughout. Tom of Finland is an important film, especially for the gay community. See more 12/27/2018 The movies focuses too much on the "finland" part and not the "tom" part. I'm not mad, just disappointed See more Read all reviews
Tom of Finland

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Movie Info

Synopsis Finnish artist Touko Laaksonen becomes famous for his homoerotic works.
Director
Dome Karukoski
Producer
Aleksi Bardy, Miia Haavisto, Annika Sucksdorff
Screenwriter
Aleksi Bardy
Distributor
Kino Lorber
Production Co
Fridthjof Film, Anagram, Helsinki Filmi Oy, Film Väst
Genre
Biography, History, Drama, LGBTQ+
Original Language
Finnish
Release Date (Theaters)
Oct 13, 2017, Limited
Release Date (Streaming)
Jan 9, 2018
Box Office (Gross USA)
$293.9K
Runtime
1h 56m
Aspect Ratio
Scope (2.35:1)
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