Reykjavík Grapevine - 04.04.2014, Page 21

Step into
the Viking Age
Experience Viking-Age Reykjavík at the
new Settlement Exhibition. The focus of the
exhibition is an excavated longhouse site which
dates from the 10th century ad. It includes
relics of human habitation from about 871, the
oldest such site found in Iceland.

Multimedia techniques bring Reykjavík’s
past to life, providing visitors with insights
into how people lived in the Viking Age, and
what the Reykjavík environment looked like
to the first settlers.
The exhibition and
museum shop are open
daily 10–17
Aðalstræti 16
101 Reykjavík / Iceland
Phone +(354) 411 6370
www.reykjavikmuseum.is
sushisamba
Þingholtsstræti 5 101 Reykjavík
Tel 568 6600 sushisamba.is
Laugavegur
HverfisgataL
æ
kj
ar
ga
ta
Sk
ól
as
tr
æ
ti
Þ
in
g
ho
lt
ss
tr
æ
ti
Skólavörðust.
Amtmannsstígur
In
g
ó
lf
ss
tr
æ
ti
Lækjar-
torg
Our kitchen is open
17.00–23.00 sun.–thu.
17.00–24.00 fri.–sat.
Amazing
6 course menu
Starts with a shot of the Icelandic
national spirit “Brennivín“
Arctic char
with cucumber andcoriander
Smoked puffin
with yuzu mayo
Minke whale
with celeriac purée
Reindeer burger
with portobello mushroom
Icelandic free range lamb fillet
with cinnamon potato
And to end on a high note ....
“Skyr“ panna cotta with white chocolate
and raspberry sorbet
6.990 kr.

A unique Icelandic Feast
21
Words
Sindri Eldon
Put Yourself Into A Horse
Benedikt Erlingsson’s Hross Í
Oss (“Of Horses And Men”)
Film
Still from 'Of Horses and Men'
REVIEW
For all of Iceland’s cinematic history, a
tendency has prevailed to portray rural
Iceland as a base and hateful place, in-
habited by a crude, simple folk of few
words and many vices, a place whose
stark natural beauty is tempered only
by the ugly depression endemic to its
populace. While I can’t exactly disagree
with the factual accuracy of this as-
sessment, it sure as hell becomes a
tired cinematic trope the eightieth time
or so that you sit through two hours of
it. So imagine my surprise when Hross
Í Oss* bravely attempts to mount this
severely beaten and thoroughly dead
horse, and actually succeeds in making
the carcass seem fresh.
‘Carcass’ is a word I would, in fact,
closely associate with Hross Í Oss. We
see a few of them in it, and never is one
of them shown with quite enough dig-
nity to refer to it as a ‘body.’ The film is,
essentially, a series of short, sharp vi-
gnettes, each one focussing on one or
more resident of an unnamed Icelan-
dic valley, and each one involving one
or more horses. Said vignettes usually
end in gruesome injury and/or death,
alternately human and equine, all of
it senseless and caused by stupidity,
pride and negligence.
Rather than try to anthropomor-
phise the horses in any sentimental
way, the humans are instead ani-
malised, as if their physical closeness
to and dependence upon nature has
brought them closer to it, in both form
and function; an admittedly simplistic
theme, I suppose, but certainly not ob-
jectionably so. The confrontational per-
niciousness of human nature and moti-
vation is unflinchingly contrasted with
the valley’s horses and their... well, their
horse-ness. I mean, they’re horses.
They’re just going to do horse things.
But the film pays careful attention to
them, too, attempting (sometimes suc-
cessfully, sometimes not) to turn the
horses’ passive nature into a tangible
thing, an element that is as much a part
of Erlingsson’s mise-en-scène as any
camera frame or angle.
Furthermore, every major character
relates far better to the film’s horses
than to each other. The horses are
where they deposit their emotional bur-
dens, inadvertently exposing the true
natures and personalities of the people
around them, and bearing mute witness
to every character study as the humans
show their best and worst sides. They
quarrel, celebrate, fail, succeed and die
as the horses and the camera watches
impassively.
Despite its generally morbid sub-
ject matter, there is a veneer of bleak
humour to it all, delivered with a dis-
tinctly Central European drab, club-
like simplicity. There is a total absence
of tearjerker performances, soul-
wrenching denouements or melodra-
ma of any kind in Hross Í Oss, and it is
one of the film’s foremost strengths, in
my opinion. Tales are told with care-
fully cast faces, written into Ingvar Sig-
urðsson’s awkward sensitivity, Char-
lotte Bøving’s gently lusting eyes and
Halldóra Geirharðsdóttir’s stern disap-
proval. The film’s few conversations
are tersely banal, while veteran cin-
ematographer Bergsteinn Björgúlfs-
son’s ever-excellent work similarly
emphasizes the negative spaces of
Iceland’s wilderness rather than mas-
turbating any obvious landmarks.
The film is occasionally marred by
an overzealous need to force-feed us
with its message of how ‘we’re all really
animals,’ and ‘how do we look through
a horse’s eyes?’ Gratuitous close-ups
literally show the horses’ eyes reflecting
the world around them, and the mating
rituals of horses and humans alike are
closely intertwined in Hross Í Oss’s sole
central storyline, to the point where the
overt symbolism and parallels began to
annoy me slightly.
Nevertheless, Hross Í Oss is a com-
petently and confidently put-together
little film, a minor triumph whose
strengths are as silent and hidden as
that of its cast of characters, both two
and four-legged. It is bold, unassum-
ing, honest and occasionally horrifying,
but never delivering more nor less than
what it promises: a simple film about
simple folk and their horses.
*You’ll notice that I’m refraining from
using the English translation of the title,
as it is awful, and whoever thought of it
should have their head examined (or just
hire a translator the next time—my rates
are very reasonable).
“Despite its generally
morbid subject matter,
there is a veneer of bleak
humour to it all, delivered
with a distinctly Central
European drab, club-like
simplicity.”