14/11/2023 - The Icelandic filmmaker discusses her debut feature film, written by Rúnar Rúnarsson and centred on the unexpected friendship between an elderly man uprooted to the city and a lonely boy

(© Léa Rener/Arras Film Festival)

Unveiled in Toronto Discovery, Ninna Pálmadóttir's Solitude [+see also:
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Cineuropa: How did you discover the script by Rúnar Rúnarsson and why did you decide to make your debut feature from it?
Ninna Pálmadóttir: I had made two short films, one about a young boy who delivered newspapers (Paperboy, winner of the 2020 Edda for Best Short Film), the other about a solitary farmer (Old Dogs Die) and by some extraordinary coincidence, those were the two main characters in the script that Rúnar Rúnarsson wanted to give to another filmmaker. I read the script and calmly talked about it with my producer Lilja Osk Snorradóttir to make sure that it was suited to me, but I very quickly understood that this was a universe which already interested me from before, which inspired me a lot and which I could make mine. And that is what Rúnar wanted. What fascinated me about that story was the strong connection that two strangers can form and the very deep impact this can have on their lives, even if they don’t know each other. Friendship is at the heart of the story and it’s a topic I’m passionate about.

Innocence is also one of the major themes of the film.
In a way, I imagined the film as a "coming of age" for the two characters. After a long period of isolation, the old man discovers the city and a new place in society. The young boy, meanwhile, is living a new situation with his parents who have split up. All of this brings them closer together and they see the world in the same innocent way. 

The elderly man is like an observer of the contemporary urban world.
For a while now, I’ve been interested in the act of reconnecting with this curiosity about the world around us which we knew as children, because I think that we are all increasingly isolated, each in our own small spaces. All of this is represented in the scenes where it’s about noticing, seeing, but it was underlined by the performance by Þröstur Leó Gunnarsson (who plays the old man) and by the fact that the two main characters are full of goodness, even if the world around them is a bit ugly. 

Without revealing it in detail, what about the misunderstanding in the film?
It’s a complex situation for both characters. On the one hand, the boy is scared, but he also realise that this allows to brings his parents together in the same room, and that they therefore get closer to him, which reunites the family. For the old man, considering the retired life he was living before, he has never had to face such things and in that moment of the film, he isn’t active, he suffers the events, he doesn’t want to create trouble and he, too, is scared by the situation. Paranoia when it comes to protecting children is perfectly understandable because our world can be scary, but there was a time when people gave people the benefit of the doubt. It’s a topic worth thinking about. 

What were you main intentions in terms of visuals?
I wanted to get across the feeling of a vibration, because this is a film of few words and with a quiet rhythm, so we needed to make it come alive, to give it some colour, to play with the pacing and not remain entirely static. I also wanted it to have a somewhat nostalgic texture, so that we couldn’t really place the film in our contemporary times. 

Who are some of your favourite filmmakers?
I love the films of Joachim Trier, especially Oslo, August 31st [+see also:
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interview: Joachim Trier
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Will you write your next film yourself?
Yes. It was very gratifying for a first-time feature director like me to benefit from such a script and to have been able to pour my heart into it, but now, it’s my turn to write for myself. 

(Translated from French)