Year: 2003
Editor's note: The following was originally written for my short-lived movie blog that had the catchy name of "A-flick-ted." Get it? Well, I like it. Anyway, that would explain the cold weather references even though this is being posted in June. I've been too busy today to do the required editing so that's that. Good movie though, should definitely check it out again.
It's been cold here in Memphis, Tennessee over the last couple of weeks. A couple of days ago, we got hit with "Snowmageddon 2011." It really came down and we ended up with a good four or five inches. I know, if you're reading this in the mid-Atlantic or up north you're going "cry me a river, man. You wouldn't last 10 minutes up here." And you'd probably be right, because the older I get the less I like the cold. I remember being a kid and playing football in the snow WITHOUT COATS and rolling around on the ground for hours on end. How did I do it? I really have to shake my head at that one.
I also probably wouldn't last very long in rural Iceland, the setting for this great, great film. If I ever make a "top 10" list, this will definitely be on it. "Noi" hits me in all the right places--it makes me laugh, think and while not it doesn't make me cry, there is still an element of sadness that hangs over the proceedings that does affect me. I've watched this movie twice lately and each time it ended I felt that same way--warmth toward Noi the character, tinged with sympathy and sorrow. One of the frequent complaints about bad movies is how there is often little connection between the characters and the viewer--you don't "care about" the characters. I dare anyone with a heart to not care about the character of Noi and his trials as he tried to find himself at a difficult age and in difficult surroundings.
Noi (played by the wonderfully expressive Tomas Lemarquis) is a high-school student and the brightest kid in the school. But school holds no interest for him and when he's not skipping class altogether, he's snoozing at his desk. Noi lives with his grandmother (Anna Fridriksdottir), a really funny, eccentric yet loving character who fires a shotgun in order to wake Noi in time for school and gives him a Viewmaster for his birthday (in a brief, but really touching scene). He also frequently sees his dad, Kiddi (Throstur Leo Gunnarsson), a failed singer, Elvis fanatic and hard drinking loser. A ray of sunshine appears early in the form of Iris (Elin Hansdottir), a city girl who has come to work at the local gas station. Noi and she quickly become an item and both yearn to escape their dreary surroundings to someplace better. After Noi's inevitable expulsion from school, he concocts a plan for them to do just that, but things don't go to plan, leading to the film's gut-wrenching climax.There is so much to admire about this film. The Icelandic scenery is breathtaking--I'd love to go one day and experience it in person but for now, this will have to do. There are several really funny scenes--not laugh-out-loud funny necessarily but truly, genuinely funny all the same. And the cast is really stellar, from Lemarquis on down. Lemarquis really is something to watch in this movie. Everything he does is subtle--an offhand comment here, a raised eyebrow there--but he is able to convey 1,000 words in each expression. And his look just adds to the character. Noi is an outcast because he is refusing to conform to small-town life. But Noi is a physical outcast as well--with his bald head and deep-set eyes, Lemarquis looks like a human embodiment of the guy in Munch's "Scream." He looks like no one else in town and pretty much like no one else you've ever seen. But his look works with the character and adds extra layers of sympathy and believability.
This is the kind of movie that it's really a shame more people haven't heard about it or seen it. But in a way I'm glad--it's like my own little secret that I have just for me, that I can enjoy over and over again.
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