A White, White Day

What’s remarkable about Hlynur Pálmason’s drama is the way its elemental settings lend everything an oneiric quality. Yet the scenes play out with a very real, visceral intensity, especially once Ingimundur uncovers an uncomfortable secret about his marriage and seeks an outlet for his anger.

The result is an emotionally wringing film, equally effective in the narrative and tone-poem departments.

This bizarre and sometimes scary film from Iceland has a way of keeping you off balance and on the edge of your seat.

A White, White Day is Ingimundur’s film through and through, centred on Sigurdsson’s intensely gruff, brooding performance. But Hlynsdóttir’s Salka gives him a run for his money.

A flesh and blood catalogue of ways to be masculine, from tender with his granddaughter to robustly no-nonsense with a weapon, Ingimundur is a fascinating character, splendidly portrayed.

It sometimes feels like Palmason is being a bit self-indulgent with his slow pace, but Ingvar Sigurdsson keeps the film grounded, and ends it with such a devastating, powerful final shot that it alone erases most criticisms. It may take a bit longer than it needed to get there, but the destination packs a wallop.

I didn’t fall for the surfeit of mood manipulation that opens A White, White Day. All that time-lapse stuff and its ilk is a nice contrast to the shock and action that takes over the third act. They’re just a very dull way of managing that.

A gorgeously filmed, well-acted tale of loss, romance and revenge that presents its story in novel ways, with ample symbolic references that cleverly reinforce the thrust of the narrative. Director Hylnur Palmason, handily a rising star, inventively tells his tale in intriguing ways, such as effectively letting his cinematography do the talking in place of words, a technique from which other filmmakers could learn a lot. However, despite the picture's many strengths, it meanders somewhat in the middle, taking longer than it should to pin down what it's trying to say. A little tidying up, slightly quickened pacing and greater emphasis on its core underlying message would have worked wonders to make a good film an even better one.

It never gets as interesting or complex as you think it will get and sometimes it feels like the movie is seeking the 100min mark as if it was first conceived as a short and then turned into a feature film. It is a nice watch, though, as photography and performances are great and the Icelandic setting gives you something different to look at.

(Mauro Lanari) A minimalism extremized up to the asphyxiating chilled rarefaction, interspersed with a handful of symbolisms between one dead time and another to tell of an adultery. When you have so little to say (revenge movie interruptus), you take refuge in style and aestheticization becomes everything.