Author: Valur Gunnarsson
Polish-Icelandic: A Society Emerges
Poles are by far the largest immigrant group in Iceland, so it was high time someone made a movie about…
Having A Ball With Simon Le Bon: Duran Duran In Iceland
by Valur Gunnarsson and Andie Sophia Fontaine
If someone in Glasgow asks you if you are a Celtics or Rangers fan, simply stating that you don’t follow…
Eclipsing the Sun: Living Legends Take Laugardalur
by Valur Gunnarsson and Andie Sophia Fontaine
There are a few concerts which can be said to have changed the Icelandic pop landscape. One of these was…
Hallgrímur Helgason: “No One Is Afraid Of Laxness Anymore”
Hallgrímur Helgason is Iceland’s best known Icelandic authors—well, after Halldór Laxness. His books have been translated to dozen of other…
From Eurovision to Bloody Murder: The Iceland Noir Festival Braces for a Storm
Reykjavík in late November sounds like the perfect setting for a crime story, and has no doubt often been used…
Murder in Heaven: Nordic Noir and Icelandic Lit
by Valur Gunnarsson and Andie Sophia Fontaine
The third Iceland Noir festival will be held this year at the Iðnó theatre on November 15th to 18th. This…
Killing the Future: Is There A “Too Soon” On Movies About Tragedies?
The problem with many movies about real life killers is that they are shown from the murderer’s point of view,…
The Devil and the Fiddle, or: Spoken Word Classical Rocks
It just might be that spoken word backed by classical music could be the new rock. And not a moment…
Selfies With Sith Lords: Iceland’s Midgard Comic-Con Comes Online
“How did Star Wars change your life?” is one of the questions posed to the panellists at Iceland’s first ever…
Murders At The Movies: Jar City Revisited
It is surprising that even though crime fiction writer Arnaldur Indriðason is something of an industry, being the best-selling writer…
Moderately Warm In The City: Billy Idol In Reykjavik
The evening starts with a surprise, and not an altogether pleasant one. Instead of getting our Billy on time, an…
All Our Yesterdays: Guns N’ Roses Take Reykjavik
Guns N’ Roses take to the stage like a lumbering Apatosaurus, crushing everything in their path and in constant danger…
The World of Yesterday : 101 Reykjavík Revisited
The ‘90s were another country. The late ‘80s had given us malls, pizza delivery, even more TV and, most important,…
The Trump Era Finds Its Poet: Sicario 2
If Denis Villeneuve‘s near-masterpiece Sicario went out of its way to be several shades of grey, then Stefano Sollima’s follow-up…
A Woman Goes To War: Finally, Iceland Is Ready For Eco-Terrorism
In the 2014-15 season, a triumvirate of films appeared that set the benchmark for Icelandic cinema in the 2010s. That…
Pain And Empathy In Award Winning Movie ‘And Breathe Normally’
A recent American film suggests that no one cares about dentists. Much the same can be said about border guards,…
Pain And Empathy In Award Winning Movie ‘And Breathe Normally’
A recent American film suggests that no one cares about dentists. Much the same can be said about border guards,…
Ben Kingsley and the New Icelandic Star of Cinema
We all remember ‘Death and the Maiden,’ the 1994 film starring Ben Kingsley as a suspected war criminal flushed out…
Festival Season Arrives: Whiling Away Winter in the City Cinemas
Back in the dark ages before the advent of Bíó Paradís, one of the few opportunities Reykvikians had to see…
Ploey: You Never Fly Alone, aka Valur The Killer vs. The Migration Birds
Perhaps one of the reasons there haven’t been very many Icelandic cartoons (apart from the probative costs), is that there…
From Crime Fiction To Running The Government: Meet Iceland’s New Prime Minister
They say everyone in Iceland knows each other, but that’s an exaggeration. I went to visit the President, Guðni Th….
A Song of Innocence: The Swan Is Born
“The worst part about this is that it’s not even original,” says the young girl, now pregnant, and with seemingly…
Last Words: Whose History?
In Brussels, they have just opened a museum of European History. But is it really possible to tell the unified…
A Song of Innocence: The Swan is Born
„The worst part about this is that its not even original,” says the young girl, now pregnant, and with seemingly…
1997: The Last Days of Rock
by Valur Gunnarsson and Andie Sophia Fontaine
Yes, rock is dead. It is dead in the sense that punk is dead. Or classical. Punk by now belongs…