SVARTUR Á LEIK (BLACK’S GAME) – icy land indeed

I can’t help it, I just love Nordic films. Iceland has a special place in my heart, and BLACK’S GAME , or SVARTUR Á LEIK (if you talk like a Viking), is as evil and cold in places as it is warm and wondrous in others. Quite like the island it comes from, where ice and hot springs keep you on your toes. Thanks to Netflix I could watch this brilliantly filmed drugpusher thriller in it’s original Icelandic version. Between scenes of sheer brutality and/or drug or alcohol induced stupor there are moments of that laid back, typically Icelandic beauty, above all in the scene where Stebbi Psycho (Thor Kristjansson– loved him in LIFE IN A FISHBOWL) and Dagný (María Birta) make love – nobody can show sex and nakedness as brutally and as romantically as those Northerners. Yes, I liked SNABBA CASH even better, but this movie has a unique quality, in cinematography, in dramaturgy and in so much great acting, that I don’t know where to start. Let’s pick the most devilish character of all, Bruno ( Damon Younger ) … I’ll keep an eye on that one.