10 Best Icelandic Movies to Watch First

10 Essential Icelandic Films

Ranked native cinema in Iceland’s own creative voice.

1. 

   1. Woman at War

   Kona fer í stríð · 2018

   A mild-mannered choir conductor leads a secret double life as an eco-saboteur waging a one-woman campaign against the aluminum industry despoiling the Icelandic highlands — until an unexpected chance to adopt a child complicates everything. A wry, rousing drama.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: An Icelandic environmental comedy-drama rooted in Icelandic highlands, activism, and local social life.

2. 

   2. Rams

   Hrútar · 2015

   In a remote Icelandic valley, two estranged brothers who have not spoken in forty years despite tending sheep side by side are forced to cooperate when a disease threatens to wipe out their prized ancestral flock. A spare, deadpan, and moving drama.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: A major Icelandic rural drama about sheep farmers, landscape, family conflict, and national rural life.

3. 

   3. Virgin Mountain

   Fúsi · 2015

   A lonely, overweight middle-aged man who finds safety in his unvarying routines is nudged out of his shell when a dance class and a fragile new friendship push him to face the world. A tender, humane character study.

4. 

   4. Noi the Albino

   Nói albínói · 2003

   A restless, misfit teenager trapped in a snowbound Icelandic fjord village dreams of escaping the bleak, isolated life around him, falling for a girl at the local gas station. Dagur Kári's dryly funny, melancholy coming-of-age drama.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: An Icelandic coming-of-age film rooted in an isolated Icelandic fjord town and local youth alienation.

5. 

   5. Angels of the Universe

   Englar alheimsins · 2000

   A sensitive young Icelandic man slides into mental illness after a heartbreak and is committed to a psychiatric hospital, where he finds camaraderie among his fellow patients. A tender, tragicomic portrait of madness and friendship.

6. 

   6. Godland

   Vanskabte land · 2022

   In the late 19th century, a young Danish priest is sent to build a church in a remote corner of Iceland and photograph its people, but the brutal landscape and his own pride slowly unmake him. A stark, stunningly shot period drama.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: An Icelandic period drama about Danish colonial and religious presence in Iceland's landscape.

7. 

   7. Of Horses and Men

   Hross í oss · 2013

   In a rural Icelandic community, the lives and loves of the locals are told through their intimate, often fateful bonds with their horses, in a series of interlaced vignettes both comic and tragic. An eccentric, striking anthology.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: An Icelandic ensemble film centered on rural horse culture and Icelandic social life.

8. 

   8. Children of Nature

   Börn náttúrunnar · 1991

   An elderly farmer unable to cope alone is placed in a Reykjavík retirement home, where he reunites with a childhood sweetheart, and the two slip away together on a final journey back to the remote fjords of their youth. A tender, Oscar-nominated road movie.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: , an Icelandic-language road elegy rooted in rural Iceland and Reykjavik.

9. 

   9. The Deep

   Djúpið · 2012

   Based on a true event, a fishing boat capsizes in the freezing waters off Iceland, and one stocky, ordinary crewman survives an impossible swim through the frigid sea — becoming a national wonder and a medical mystery. A gripping survival drama.

   Why & details

   Curator’s note: An Icelandic survival drama based on a real Icelandic fishing disaster and national survival story.

10. 

    10. Heima

    2007

    This intimate concert documentary follows the Icelandic band Sigur Rós as they return home after a world tour to play a series of free, impromptu shows in fields, halls, and villages across their homeland. A lyrical portrait of music and landscape.