The First Annual Icelandic Film Festival—benefiting the 826 Valencia Writing Project—will be presented at the Castro Theater on October 29 and 30, 2004 by McSweeney’s, Oddi Printing of Reykjavík, 826 Valencia, the Castro Theater, and co-sponsored by Iceland Naturally and the Iceland Film Centre.

The festival is the first Icelandic-only film festival in the United States and will include internationally recognized and award-winning films such as In the Shoes of the Dragon, winner of the 2000 Edda Award (Icelandic Academy Award) for Best Documentary; The Sea, winner of Film of the Year, Best Actor, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Professional Category: Sound/Vision at the 2002 Edda Awards; and Noi Albinoi, directed by Dagur Kári and winner of Best Film, Best Actor, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor, Professional Category: Sound/Vision at the 2003 Edda Awards.

Most films will be in Icelandic with English subtitles. Each program will include an introduction by a special guest such as an Icelandic dignitary and Icelandic pop star, Mugison. The introductions will also be translated into Icelandic live for the benefit of the non-English speaking Icelanders in the audience. All events take place at San Francisco’s historic Castro Theater. All tickets are $10.00 single admission or an All-Festival Pass is $45.00. For ticket information, please visit Ticket Web.

Festival Schedule:

Friday, October 29
7:00 PM—Cold Fever (Á Köldum Klaka), by Fridrik Thór Fridriksson, 1995 (87 min)
This is the perfect Icelandic film for people who know nothing about Iceland. It’s the story of a young Japanese businessman on a journey across the frozen countryside and the bizarre travelers he meets along the way. Starkly beautiful, this film is a surreal postcard from an enchanted land.
Awards:
Channel 4 Director’s Award—1995 Edinburgh International Film Festival
Golden Dolphin Award—1996 Festroia—Troia International Film Festival
Golden Space Needle Award—1996 Seattle International Film Festival (Best Actress—Lili Taylor)

9:30 PM—In the Shoes of the Dragon (Í skóm drekans), by Árni Sveinsson & Hrönn Sveinsdóttir, 2002 (90 min)
In 2000, the Year of the Dragon, Hronn Sveinsdottir, an ambitious young filmmaker, enters the Miss Iceland beauty pageant in order to capture the utter absurdity of the enterprise. However, she unexpectedly becomes obsessed with the pageant, struggling with her own self-image. Ironically, Sveinsdottir’s feminist mother’s competitive nature encourages her to win the crown. This film was banned in Iceland due to the legal protests of the pageant owners. There will be a special Q&A session following the movie with the director and actors of the film, Árni Sveinsson and Hrönn Sveinsdóttir.
Awards:
Best Documentary—2000 Edda Awards, Icelandic Academy Awards

Saturday, October 30
1:30 PM—The Sea (Háfi), by Baltasar Kormákur, 2002 (109 min)
A proud businessman, Thordur, rules over an isolated fishing village as the owner of the local fish-processing factory, fishing vessels, and all the important fishing licenses. Spurred on by old age and the writing of his memoir, Thordur summons his three adult children from near and abroad to discuss the fate of the business. The children pressure him to sell and retire to the city. Against a bleak Icelandic landscape of rock and ice, the family’s dark history erupts into a storm of acidic accusations, exposed secrets, and forbidden sexual encounters.
Awards:
Film of the Year, Best Actor, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Professional Category: Sound/Vision—2003 Edda Awards, Icelandic Academy Awards
FIPRESCI Prize—2003 International Competition, Istanbul International Film Festival
Official screenings at Sundance (2003) and Toronto Film Festivals

4:30 PM—Noi Albinoi (Nói Albínói), by Dagur Kári, 2002 (92 min)
Surrounded by mountains and sea, suffocating in a desolate village on Iceland’s West Fjords, the precocious outcast Noi attempts his escape. In this darkly comedic story of adolescence, his increasingly reckless attempts—as well as everything else—contend with futility. All that is certain, it seems, is more snow.
Awards:
Best Film, Best Actor, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor, Professional Category:
Sound/Vision—2003 Edda Awards, Icelandic Academy Awards
Golden Iris Award—2003 Brussels European Film Festival
Best European Film—2003 Denver International Film Festival
Cinemas Award, Best Soundtrack, European Jury Award—2003 Angers European First Film Festival
Movie Zone Award—2003 Rotterdam International Film Festival

7:00 PM—Rock in Reykjavik
Rock in Reykjavik isn’t much more than concert footage from the late seventies and early eighties showing Icelandic hipsters in white chinos. But the bands are amazing—either in the sense that they are genuinely great, like the Tappi Tikarrass, with a radically young Björk hitting a drum at exactly the right wrong time—or in the sense that they’re just genuine, like the mowhawked punk who can’t be older than 14 smashing his guitar onstage and then flinching when he riles the audience up more than he expected. There will also be a special performance by Icelandic pop star Mugison.

9:30 PM—101 Reykjavik (101 Reykjavík), by Baltasar Kormákur, 2000 (100 min)
Twenty-eight-year-old slacker Hlynur still lives at his mother’s house in Reykjavik, in the same cluttered bedroom he grew up in, surviving on porn and government hand-outs. Local girl Hofyis is drawn to—and, she claims, impregnated by—Hlynur, but he has eyes for the new guest in his house (his mother’s Spanish flamenco teacher, Lola). Filmed by the renowned Icelandic actor Baltasar Kormakur, 101 Reykjavik gives us a refreshingly honest, funny, and entertaining portrayal of insular Reykjavik nightlife and contemporary Icelandic culture.
Awards:
Film of the Year, Actor of the Year, Actress of the Year, Professional Category: Screenwriting, Director of the Year—2000 Edda Awards, Icelandic Academy Awards
Discovery Award—2000 Toronto International Film Festival
Prize of the Ecumenical Jury—2000 Lübeck Nordic Film Days

About the Sponsors:
Founded by Bay Area author Dave Eggers in 2002, 826 Valencia helps students, ages 8 to 18, develop their writing skills. The nonprofit offers free drop-in tutoring, workshops, school field trips, a summer camp, and extensive classes for English language-learners. Additionally, 826 Valencia provides space and guidance for students who wish to create their own story collections, zines, and other publications.

McSweeney’s is an independent publishing company that publishes McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, The Believer, and books by authors including Nick Hornby, Lydia Davis, William T. Vollmann, Robert Coover and many others.

Oddi Printing is internationally recognized as one of the finest printers of illustrated books, catalogs, and magazines. They have printed most McSweeney’s publications, many of which have won design awards. Most recently, a number of McSweeney’s/Oddi books were featured in the National Design Triennial in New York.

Iceland Naturally is a joint marketing program among Iceland’s tourism and business interests to build a relationship between Iceland and American consumers interested in Iceland, its products, and its spectacular scenery.

Icelandic Film Centre is an organization dedicated to nurturing and encouraging further growth in the film industry in Iceland, which has the distinction of being both an art form and a business. The Icelandic Film Centre supports production, distribution and promotion of Icelandic films, gathers information about Icelandic films and publishes it, and advances film culture in Iceland and encourages stronger links between Icelandic filmmakers and the international film community.

For more information contact:

Yosh Han
415-642-5905 ext 0
yosh@826valencia.com