I try to watch any Nordic crime/thriller I can. I'm a huge fan of Beck, Wallander, Varg Veum, The Killing etc, and altho this isn't a part of a series, it's somewhat similar. You have a reporter (like Stieg Larssons trilogy) and a suspected crime to solve.
The story is rather simple, but engaging. What really makes this movie worthwhile is the atmosphere. I love arctic, snowy, isolated locations and this really excels there. The Icelandic scenery, huge power plant, a few shots over Reykjavik, windy and snowy outdoor scenes, you really feel the cold and isolation.
The cinematography is great, altho like mentioned already, it's highly stylized with very tight color scheme of bluish cold colors. Often you see this kind of choice in cinematography to make digital video look less video-like, but I read here that this was actually shot on film. There is some visible grain, but it doesn't really matter, the images mostly look great and it's a real pleasure to watch.
I don't speak Icelandic, but I felt the acting was very good and natural. There were many scenes that would've looked really dumb, had they been handled differently, especially in the latter half.
Storywise I think it was pretty similar to other Nordic crime stories and this could easily be part of a series. One thing I wasn't quite sure about the story was the "supernatural" element, or was it supernatural, you can't really be sure, but there is some mystery there that isn't explained. There were also some revelations and twists in the end that I'm not sure were really needed anymore, but as a whole I really enjoyed this movie.
I actually recorded this movie few months ago and watched it half way until realizing it wasn't completely recorded. It was so good I ended up watching it from beginning to end on the second go few months after, just for the atmosphere.
The story is rather simple, but engaging. What really makes this movie worthwhile is the atmosphere. I love arctic, snowy, isolated locations and this really excels there. The Icelandic scenery, huge power plant, a few shots over Reykjavik, windy and snowy outdoor scenes, you really feel the cold and isolation.
The cinematography is great, altho like mentioned already, it's highly stylized with very tight color scheme of bluish cold colors. Often you see this kind of choice in cinematography to make digital video look less video-like, but I read here that this was actually shot on film. There is some visible grain, but it doesn't really matter, the images mostly look great and it's a real pleasure to watch.
I don't speak Icelandic, but I felt the acting was very good and natural. There were many scenes that would've looked really dumb, had they been handled differently, especially in the latter half.
Storywise I think it was pretty similar to other Nordic crime stories and this could easily be part of a series. One thing I wasn't quite sure about the story was the "supernatural" element, or was it supernatural, you can't really be sure, but there is some mystery there that isn't explained. There were also some revelations and twists in the end that I'm not sure were really needed anymore, but as a whole I really enjoyed this movie.
I actually recorded this movie few months ago and watched it half way until realizing it wasn't completely recorded. It was so good I ended up watching it from beginning to end on the second go few months after, just for the atmosphere.