REYKJAVIK-ROTTERDAM
Iceland, 2008, 88 minutes, Colour.
Baltasar Kormakur, Ingvar Eggert Sigurdsson, Lilja Nott Borarinsdottir.
Directed by Oskar Jonasson.
Reykjavik - Rotterdam won a number of awards in Iceland. It is a gritty short drama focusing on smuggling rackets between Holland and Iceland.
Icelandic director Baltasar Kormakur (Reykjavik 101, Jar City, White Wedding) is very good as the smuggler who has spent time in jail, attends AA meetings, has married and has a family, but is trapped into doing one more voyage. His wife’s brother is caught up in a racket and Kristofer, the Kormakur character, is forced into going to Holland, smuggling the alcohol that he was used to doing, but gets caught up in drug trafficking as well. His friend, Steingrimur, exercises pressure on him – and is then betrayed, Steingrimur having moved into drug trafficking as well as having designs on his former girlfriend who is now Kristofer’s wife. The film shows the central character, his friends on the ship helping him with the smuggling, his interactions with the hostile captain, his involvement in a robbery in Rotterdam and his escape back to the boat, his shrewdness in covering all his tracks and surviving to the end.
Actor-director Kormakur was chosen to be the director of the American remake, Contraband with Mark Wahlberg, Kate Beckinsale and Ben Foster. The remake follows the original fairly closely in plot outline while having a bigger budget to elaborate the characters as well as the situations and have quite a number of special effects and action sequences. The new locations were New Orleans to Panama. The ending of the Icelandic film is reproduced quite effectively in Contraband, the villain attacking Kristofer’s wife, wrapping her in plastic and intending her to be buried under cement, only for Kristofer to ring her and her mobile phone indicating where she had been buried.
An interesting film in its own right – and interesting in comparison with the remake.
1. An Icelandic film? Thriller? Grounded in the life of Reykjavik? Smuggling? Family?
2. The Reykjavik settings, the bleakness of the Arctic Circle? The town, homes? The wharves, ships and containers? An authentic feel? The musical score?
3. Kristofer and his history, his working as a security guard, the time spent in prison, his attending AA meetings? His love for Iris, their children? Making ends meet, pressures with rent, the sale of their house? His friendship with Steingrimur? The proposal to do another trip? His conflict with Iris’s brother and his making a mistake? His decision to go, Iris’s reaction, her farewell? The interaction with the captain, Steingrimur ringing him and ensuring Kristofer go on board? To work in the galley and the kitchen? Kristofer meeting his old friends again, setting up the smuggling – alcohol? The arrival in Rotterdam, the experience of the robbery and the contacts, the police, escaping with the van and the Jackson Pollock picture? Being back on the boat on time, the captain finding him in the galley? The van in the container? His covering his tracks? His arrival home, the phone calls, realising that Steingrimur had betrayed him? The interactions with Iris’s brother, the discovery of the drugs? His taking the gang to the captain’s house, ringing the police? His evading them? Confronting Steingrimur on the building site, phoning Iris, hearing the mobile phone ring, rescuing her? In hospital? Painting the house at the end – surviving?
4. Steingrimur, his role in smuggling in the past? His building? His past relationship with Iris? His friendship with Kristofer, the visit, offering him the old fridge, taking away the former fridge? His being a good friend? The irony of his drug dealings? His thugs? Their threatening Iris and the children? His phone calls, to the captain? The final confrontation with Kristofer, his injuring Iris, putting her in the plastic, putting her on the building site? His fear of Kristofer? His arrest?
5. The captain of the ship, hostile to Kristofer because of the past smuggling? Checking on him? The irony of Kristofer sending the thugs to his house? He and his wife being taken in?
6. Iris’s brother, the opening sequence, the thugs pursuing him and his friend? Their throwing the drugs overboard, having to repay? The smuggling of the drugs on the ship? Kristofer discovering this? The end, the thugs confronting Kristofer and the brother in the car, his running away, the pursuit, his falling down the cliff?
7. The reality of the situation, smuggling, the pressure on Kristofer, his techniques? His friends and their participation?
8. Iris, with the children, the threats, the advances of Steingrimur, her being injured, buried, rescued?
9. The grittiness of this film, down-to-earth? The comparisons with the American remake – the work of the actor-director?
