Baltasar Kormákur’s latest movie, Mýrin (The Moor), based on a novel by renowned Icelandic suspense writer Arnaldur Indridason, premiered last night.
The lead character in Mýrin, and in most of Indridason’s books, is detective Erlendur Sveinsson, a middle-aged loner who has made many mistakes in his life.
Erlendur is played by actor Ingvar E. Sigurdsson, who starred in Englar Alheimsins (Angels of the Universe) and has also had a few roles outside of Iceland.
According to Fréttabladid, Sigurdsson does an excellent job interpreting Erlendur, which is not easy when everyone has an opinion of how he should look and act.
The other detectives are played by Björn Hlynur Haraldsson and Ólafía Hrönn Jónsdóttir, who were, as Fréttabladid wrote, not disappointing in their roles either.
The biggest surprise was perhaps Ágústa Eva Erlendsóttir. She is best known for playing the infamous character Silvía Nótt, an ego-centric, rude and pushy young woman, who was Iceland’s representative in this year’s Eurovision Song Contest.
Fréttabladid says Erlendsdóttir managed to break herself free of Silvía Nótt, who had brought her to stardom, and convincingly play the role of Erlendur’s troubled daughter Eva Lind.
Mýrin is set in modern Reykjavík. An old man is murdered and Erlendur and his colleagues investigate the case. Every new piece of evidence takes them further into the past, back to “old” Iceland, which clashes with the modern world.
Erlendur himself leads an old way of life. He is stuck in the past and doesn’t belong in the modern world. But the murder case pushes him into the present while the ghosts of the past haunt him.
Indridason’s books have been published in 26 countries and translated into 10 languages. The novel Mýrin is called Tainted Blood in English.
Indridason won the Glass Key for the best Scandinavian crime novel in 2002 and 2003 and in 2005 he received the CWA Gold Dagger Award for the novel Silence of the Grave.
