Reykjavík Grapevine - 20.10.2017, Qupperneq 52

52 The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 19 — 2017
Dark Shadows
Cause Deep Rifts
In ‘Undir Trénu’
Emotions run hot under the shade of a tree in
this Icelandic dark comedy, now available to
watch with English subtitles at Bió Paradís
Words: Charley Ward Photo: Subjects own
In Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurðs-
son’s third feature, ‘Undir Trénu'
('Under the Tree'), the shadow cast
from the tree next door sparks a
seething feud between neighbours
which ultimately culminates in
tragedy. Through its suburban set-
ting and tight knit cast of intrigu-
ing and troubled characters, the
film deftly juxtaposes raw emo-
tion with the banalities of daily life
to bleakly funny effect. Mooning
garden gnomes,
IKEA’s looming
presence, wel l
meaning school
t e a c h e r s a n d
unpleasant resi-
dent meetings all
provide fodder
for laughs as the
film moves—and
finally lurches—
towards its bi-
zarre conclusion.
“Many people
say that we Ice-
landers have a
dark sense of humour, and I agree,”
says producer Grímar Jónsson. “But
I think the theme and the humour
definitely travels. I get the feeling it
takes people on different journeys.
“I've had this experience when
showing the film to different audi-
ences,” Grímar continues. “During
a certain scene, we had a screening
where people were literally crying,
but a couple of days later in the
same scene, a different audience
was screaming with laughter.”
Family drama
The two branches of the story are
entwined by a shared undercur-
rent of unhappy family dynamics,
established from the outset. The
film opens with young father Atli
(Steinþór Hróar Steinþórsson), a
mostly unsympathetic chap, being
given the boot by his wife Agnes
(Lára Jóhanna Jónsdóttir) after get-
ting caught watching a homemade
sex tape of himself and his former
girlfriend. Atli doesn’t take this de-
velopment well, and begins stalk-
ing Agnes in his car and pulling
his daughter out
of school during
the day without
permission, be-
fore resigning
himself to mov-
ing back in with
his parents.
But Atli’s par-
ents are facing
their own chal-
lenges. Retired
c o u p l e I n g a
(Edda Björgvin-
s d ó t t i r) a n d
Ba ldv i n (Sig-
urður Sigurjónsson) occupy one
in a line of cookie cutter abodes in
the suburbs with just one salient
difference—a tree in the garden.
A rare and precious commodity in
Iceland, it becomes the centrepiece
of an ongoing dispute between the
couple and their neighbours, Kon-
ráð (Þorsteinn Bachmann) and his
young second wife Eybjörg (Selma
Björnsdóttir). Despite repeated
requests from the neighbours,
Baldvin has not pruned the tree
that stretches over their shared
fence, and Inga would prefer to
keep it that way.
“There are several stories that
come together,” says Grímar.
“There's not one main character
in a classical dramatic structure.
It was a challenge but that is also
what was so intriguing. That was
really exciting for me.”
Escalating tensions
Inga’s stone cold remarks about Ey-
björg and her passion for fitness
take passive aggressive snarkiness
to new heights, drawing a laugh
each time as Eybjörg looks on in-
credulously. For those in the know,
the effect is heightened by actress
Edda’s standing as one of Iceland’s
premier comedians. “Some people
only have to see her face to start
laughing,” says Grímar. “So to see
her as this mean bitch is pretty
ironic.
“But this is more of the black
comedy,” he continues. “It is some-
thing we deliberately thought of
when casting for the film.” The
same is true for Steinþór, who plays
Atli. “He’s a superstar among teen-
agers as a comedian, so we were
pretty bold in casting those two
main characters.”
But Inga’s cutthroat quips speak
to her sadness of losing a son, pre-
sumed dead, the details of which
are left nebulous seemingly even
to the characters themselves, as
she veers between hilarity and just
plain insanity. When poor Inga’s
cat goes missing, the neighbours’
dog soon follows in one of the
film’s most outlandish twists, and
the dispute over a tree descends
into all out war.
All the while, Monika Lencze-
wska’s unrelentingly grey cinema-
tography gives the film an oppres-
sive feel, which is compounded by
the gloom of Daniel Bjarnason’s
sparsely used, sombre score.
Grímar notes that many neigh-
bour disputes in Iceland transpire
over trees, and feels that these
tensions are something that most
individuals can relate to. But he
gives a warning to those currently
embroiled in such spats when I ask
him what he would like viewers to
come away feeling at the end of the
film. “Like, ‘What the fuck?’,” he
says. “ I think maybe that's the feel-
ing that I relate to, at least—like,
was this all for nothing?”
“Some people
only have to
see her face to
start laughing,
so to see her as
this mean bitch
is pretty ironic.”
The film lurches towards its bizarre conclusion.
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