In one of his stand-up routines, Icelandic comedian Ari Eldjárn famously and lovingly poked fun at the close-knit nature of the Nordic film community. The 2024 edition of Stockfish, Iceland’s foremost festival, lived up to that stereotype, in a very good way. Over the course of eleven days (April 4-14), it allowed professionals and casual audiences to connect in a warm, intimate manner, celebrating national and international cinema in all its forms.
The event’s audience-oriented nature is evident in its programming strategy: about 20-25 films, with no premiere status requirement for features (whereas the Shortfish competition, showcasing works by emerging Icelandic filmmakers, are world premieres), all playing in the late afternoon and evening. Additionally, to celebrate the festival’s tenth anniversary, all screenings were free of charge, as a way of thanking viewers for their loyalty.
They, in turn, showed up quite eagerly, to watch films old and new and listen to filmmakers like Lynne Ramsay, this year’s international Honorary Award recipient, and Friðrik Þór Friðriksson, who had a whale of time interacting with everyone before and after the screening of his 1995 movie Cold Fever, which screened as part of a series devoted to the country’s cinematic heritage.
The mornings and early afternoons were focused on various industry topics, including a behind-the-scenes look at how festivals themselves are put together, with Mimi Plauché, artistic director of the Chicago International Film Festival, in conversation with her Stockfish counterpart Hrönn Kristinsdóttir (an award-winning producer whose credits include the 2021 hit Lamb).
Other highlights of the professional-centric side of things included a roundtable with Nordic and Baltic film schools (choice revelation: many students are rebelling against the increasingly digital creative landscape by making more projects on celluloid) and the customary unveiling of Icelandic works in progress seeking post-production funds, distribution and/or international sales. This writer is particularly curious to see the finished version of Temporary Shelter, an account of refugee life on a former military base filmed by one of the refugees (Anastasiia Bortual, a Ukrainian film student who had to cut her education short as a result of the war).
The Scandinavian feel, with modernity and tradition blending seamlessly, extended to the choice of locations for the festival’s happenings. The screenings were all at Bio Paradìs, a centrally located cinema in downtown Reykjavik, while some of the industry talks took place half an hour away on foot at the Nordic House, a culture center situated right next to Vatnsmyri Park and a stone’s throw from the National Museum, more openly in contact with nature.
The intermingling of past and present (and future) was also strong in the choice of films to bookend the festival. The opening slot went to Eternal, the Danish sci-fi romance drama dealing with the consequences of climate change. Denmark was also this year’s Country in Focus, with three films screened and a masterclass given by Helle Hansen, the former documentary commissioner for the Danish Film Institute. The closing movie, conversely, was Belle, an English-language Icelandic retelling of Beauty and the Beast which takes full advantage of the primal imagery of its locations to put a personal spin on the age-old tale.
(Relatively) small in scale but huge in ambition and its sincere love of cinema, this edition of Stockfish truly had something for everyone, including that rarest of things at pretty much any festival: the possibility of watching every single movie in the program. And judging by the crowds entering Bio Paradìs, a few people did just that.
