Film review: Godland, compelling, visceral tale of colonial Iceland

****

Before he became a celebrated globetrotting documentarian, a disapproving Alan Whicker of the natural world, the young German filmmaker Werner Herzog made his reputation with movies about European adventurers trying to export their culture and religion to the heathen wildernesses.

Films like Aguirre, Wrath Of God and Fitzcaraldo were less dramatisations than full-scale costume recreations haphazardly documented and barely less perilous than the original expeditions.

Godland (Image: Snowglobe Films)

Icelandic director Hlynur Pálmason made his international breakthrough with A White, White Day, and has used that to embark on a project of Herzogian proportions, telling the story of a 19th century Danish priest (Hove) sent to Iceland - then a Danish colony - to construct a church.

As he travels across the brutal and unforgiving terrain with Ragnar (Sigurdsson), the hardy but resentful Icelander who will be his guide and church builder, his faith is severely tested.

Right from the early scenes on the boat trip over, it’s clear that nobody had an easy time on this. There are numerous points where the discomfort suffered by the characters on screen must have been shared to a lesser degree by the performers. On this film, everybody’s a method actor.Godland (Image: Snowglobe Films)

Those in the audience have their own deprivation to deal with. Iceland has provided spectacular backdrops for superhero and sci-fi epics, but Pálmason's visual approach is murk and shadow. It's set in the summer, which means constant rain.

In the opening scene where the priest receives his instructions, it is so hard to make out the faces that I thought there was something wrong with the projection. If you're watching it at home, the temptation to fiddle with the contrast will be overwhelming. Throughout the film, the features on faces that you'd expect to be the focus of a scene can barely be discerned. Despite that, it is a marvellous spectacle and Pálmason's threadbare narrative, full of tactical ambiguities, is visceral and compelling.Godland is in cinemas on April 6 (Image: Snowglobe Films)

Directed by Hlynur Pálmason. Starring Eliott Crosset Hove, Ingvar Sigurdsson, Vic Carmen Sonne, Jacob Lohmann, Hilmar Gudjónsson and Ída Mekkín Hlynsdóttir.  In cinemas and on Curzon Home Cinema. April 6. Running time 143 mins.

Go to http://half-man-half-critic.weebly.com/ for a review of the Studiocanal home entertainment release of The City Of Lost Children.