22/01/2015 - At 43, the film’s lead character, Fúsi, still finds it hard to become an adult

Icelandic director Dagur Kári’s Virgin Mountain has been handpicked by festival director Dieter Kosslick for a Berlinale Special Gala at the Berlin International Film Festival (5-15 February), where Kári’s fourth feature will have its world premiere.

Kári (born Dagur Kári Pétursson) has himself written the script and, together with Orri Jónsson, the musical score, performed by their electronica duo, Slowblow. Virgin Mountain is the story of Fúsi, a 43-year-old Icelander who sleepwalks through the mundane routine of everyday life. 

Fúsi, who lives alone with his mother where they have always lived, has yet to find the courage to enter into adulthood, until a vivacious woman and an eight-year-old girl force him to make changes. Gunnar Jónsson and Ilmur Kristjánsdóttir play the leads.

Born to Icelandic parents in Paris, Kári was educated at the Danish National Film School in Copenhagen; his graduation short, Lost Weekend (2000), won 11 international awards. His feature debut, Noi the Albino, received six Eddas, Iceland’s national film prize.

His second movie, Dark Horse [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (2005), was selected for Un Certain Regard at Cannes (and took five Eddas), while in 2009 he directed his first English-language feature, The Good Heart [+see also:
trailer
film profile], starring Paul Dano and Brian Cox, which bagged the Nordic Vision Award at Göteborg (and four Eddas). 

Supported by the Icelandic Film Centre, Virgin Mountain was staged by Icelandic director-producer Baltasar Kormákur, together with Agnes Johansen, for Kormákur’s Blueeyes Productions. International sales are handled by Paris-based Bac Films.