Euthanizer

Teemu Nikki’s 2017 “Euthanizer” (Armomurhaaja) is a brutal, unflinching film that straddles the uneasy line between drama, horror, and black comedy. It tells the story of Veijo (Matti Onnismaa), a misanthropic mechanic in a bleak Finnish rural town who moonlights as a low-cost executioner of unwanted pets. 

His methods are neither clinical nor kind - gasifying animals with old car exhaust fumes, suffocating them in sacks, or shooting them in the woods - but he believes his work is a necessary mercy. In contrast, the local veterinarian, who represents a more “civilized” yet commercialized approach to euthanasia, sees him as a competitor. Society at large, however, simply despises him.

Nikki crafts a cruel and filthy world, both literally and metaphorically. The film is steeped in grime, grease-streaked hands, sweat-soaked undershirts, and the rusted remains of cars and lives abandoned to decay. But its filth runs deeper, exposing the moral contradictions of human nature. 

Veijo’s self-imposed role as an executioner expands beyond animals when he takes it upon himself to rid the world of their cruel, unlovable owners. In a narrative that subtly plays with karma, it’s a film that asks: Who truly deserves mercy? And who decides?

The performances in “Euthanizer” shift between heightened realism and something almost grotesque. Onnismaa’s Veijo is a man burdened by a philosophy of justice that isolates him, yet the film never makes him sympathetic in a conventional way. He’s a man of conviction but not of warmth, a character whose moral rigidity leads him to dark and irreversible places. 

Surrounding him are figures that blur the lines between good and evil: a sadistic gang member, a passive-aggressive veterinarian, a woman drawn to Veijo’s brutality. Everyone in “Euthanizer” is, in some way, repulsive - and yet, the film compels us to watch them, to wrestle with the discomfort they provoke.

There’s something almost mythic in Nikki’s storytelling. He presents a world where the agony of men and animals are intertwined, yet treated differently, with an implicit suggestion that some lives hold more value than others. 

But “Euthanizer” doesn’t offer easy compassion. It’s brutal, unflinching, and resolute in its vision. Its grungy aesthetic keeps the film grounded, even as its morality drifts into the surreal.

By the time the story reaches its inevitable, grim finale, we’re left with a lingering unease - a testament to Nikki’s ability to turn the grotesque into something deeply compelling.

“Euthanizer” is not a film for everyone. It’s not mainstream, nor does it seek to be. It’s deliberately slow, demanding more than passive viewing - it insists on deeper engagement.

It is a story of justice disguised as cruelty and cruelty disguised as justice - an ugly, unrelenting meditation on the cost of mercy.