fred-kurz-698-387544 You watch the film once and you wonder why you did. A few days go by while you are slowly, increasingly, haunted by what you saw and heard. You watch it again and realize you haven't seen it. As the film plays, it grows into something vast, the more remote the more huge and you realize that what you knew of anything before was way too small and confining. You begin to get some idea of how BIG it all is without having moved from your seat. The old couple is showing you in their ever wider almost nonchalant voyage. And the soundtrack makes sure you are there with them and sometimes beyond them. No other film+music is remotely like it.

storybandit This movie begins with Geirri leaving the family farm and moving in with his family. He's gotten to old to handle farming on his own, and his family has decided that they are more suited to life in the city. The attempt to merge into his daughter's hectic life doesn't work out and he finds himself in a nursing home, surrounded by fellow retirees - some of whom are loving the time and the freedom the home allows right alongside others who are not.Geirri meets up with Stella, a childhood sweetheart who has decided that dying in a nursing home is something she does not want to do. So, they decide to leave together. By the dead of night they steal a car and head for the towns of their youth...Geirri and Stella are running form the law (leaving the home without permission and, more importantly, car theft), but there is no 'Bonnie and Clyde' feeling to this story. They return to the towns they knew and remember the years together. There are spirits in their mind and spirits of the ocean who meet them along the way. You get an excellent sense of their strength, knowledge, and experience.All in all, this movie is very touching - until the end.I really appreciated the journey and the experiences Geirri and Stella have, but the plot twist that brings the viewer to a final scene which is (in my opinion) brutal, disturbing, and (to be frank) confusing end. Yes, Geirri running from the law, and yes, he is trying to maintain his freedom, but...the rocks and the feet...?Confusing and jarring. There was a fascinating mystical feel to the way the movie plays itself out, and one could theorize that the ending was more symbolic than realistic. But, why throw that kind of symbolism onto the end of such a touching (and realistic) movie?Even so, I highly recommend this movie. There's to much to be gained from the movie as a whole to allow the oddness of the ending to stop you from seeing it.

dodge-8 I´m sorry to say, but this film is one of the worst from Iceland. It has some of the most dumbest plot lines ever filmed, and everyone who has ever heard anything of Iceland knows that old people are not mistreated the way it´s portrayed in this flick. An Oscar nomination...give me a break. It would have been more believable to let Die Hard take place here than this film.

freejack-2 I ´ve seen some of the earlier works of Fridrik and with one exception hated them all. He started by insulting the Icelandic nation by doing a horrible (and terribly long film) about one of nation's greatest writers. Then he did a documentary about Iceland and got almost all of through the windscreen of a car, driving too fast. "Rock in Reykjavik" was a pleasant documentary and really fun to watch. But this film puts him among the world's most talented directors and for a small nation, that is a lot of responsibillity. Since he did "Börn Náttúrunnar" he hasn´t done anything to speak of but it´s hard to tell whether he has passed his peak, or the best has yet to come.