Jim Jarmusch called "The Man Without a Past," "sad enough to make you laugh and funny enough to make you cry," and with that one of our greatest filmmakers perfectly sums up the latest film from one of Europe's best filmmakers, Finland's Aki Kaurismaki.

A nameless man hops off a train at a Helsinki station at 4 a.m. and plops himself down on a park bench with his suitcase. Soon after, he's attacked by thugs who rob and beat him nearly to death. Declared dead at the hospital, he instead walks out without any memory of who is is.

We don't know who he is, either, or why he's there, which pretty much puts us in his shoes. But we do see him soon embraced (?) by Helsinki's homeless and poor and he slowly begins to put a new life together, despite the occasional hiccup which occurs any time he comes into contact with "official" society.

In these Kafka-esque encounters (the character is even called simply "M." in the film's credits), society wants a name and when it finds he doesn't have one, it turns ugly. But M. still manages to find some goodwill among his peers, who care for him until he is well, help him find a place to live, take him to the soup kitchen and set him up with electricity. What do they want in return? His electrician friend says only, "when you see me lying face down in the gutter turn me over on my back."

Sure, he encounters some resistance even there among the downcast. One man steals his shoes while he sleeps. The man who rents him his humble abode acts the tough, but is a softie deep down.

Despite his lack of a name or of a past, our unnamed man even manages to find love and a nascent career as a rock and roll manager!

Like Antonioni's "Deserto Rosso," the film -- whose 1999 silent film "Juha" was received with acclaim -- is stunningly beautiful despite its setting in an industrial and social wasteland.

The deadpan humor and wittily staged scenes -- to say nothing of the eclectic performances of the entire cast -- will make you laugh, even when the story is melancholy or downright depressing. Kaurismaki knows that even when viewers are laughing, they're feeling and they're thinking and "The Man Without a Past" is wonderful because it will make you do all of those.

"The Man Without a Past" opens Fri., May 30 at Landmark's Downer Theatre.