Moving Pictures' Scandinavian Bureau chief Jorn Rossing Jensen used to boast that he was an authority on Icelandic films - he'd seen both of them. But, as he reports, since the mid-80s Iceland has seen a huge increase in film production, both from native and overseas filmmakers

In Iceland you simply set up a camera, and you have US$1 billion of free production design," says American producer Jim Stark, who backed such features as Jim Jarmusch's Down by Law, Mystery Train and Night on Earth.

Stark became so fascinated by the country that, instead of just using it as a location for an international production, he co-wrote a story which is actually set there, directed by Fridrik Thor Fridriksson, who has so far earned Iceland's only Oscar nomination, for Children of Nature in 1992.

Labelled 1993 Best Nordic Film, it went on to win 23 foreign prizes.

Starring Masatoshi Nagase, of Mystery Train fame, Cold Fever - the Stark-Fridriksson effort - is currently on release in the US through Artistic License Films, and is set to become one of the most successful Scandinavian films in America in recent years.

Besides providing the training ground for Neil Armstrong's moonwalk, the island in the Atlantic has performed in numerous US features, which have exploited the astounding scenery not only to replace more difficult shots in space, but also for such actioners as Judge Dredd, the Sylvester Stallone starrer, and A View to a Kill.

But since the early 80s Iceland has had a thriving film industry of its own, too. Icelandic cinema used to consist of Agust Gudmundsson's Land and Sons, Hrafn Gunnlaugfsson's My Father's Estate, and a selection of volcanic eruptions from a production company which has filmed the Hekla's whims for generations.

But all that has changed. Last year, for instance, the Icelandic capital of Reykjavik accommodated the premieres of seven new features - all produced in a country with a population of just 260,000, and with state subsidy for the Icelandic Film Fund totalling ISK99 (US$13.1) million.

By comparison, the Czech Republic should have produced not 20, but 228 films.

"But although Iceland's heritage has always been expressed through its literature, it might as well have been created with filmmakers in mind," says Icelandic President Vigdis Finnbogadóttir, a former managing director of the Reykjavik City Theatre, and a strong supporter of Icelandic cinema.

"Times are getting tough, though, for digging up film financing, especially for first-time directors, due to the limited resources of the fund," adds head of the fund's international department, Anna Mária Karlsdóttir, who has collaborated with programme director John Riley on the Rack Focus of seven recent Icelandic movies, screening at this year's Prague International Film Festival.

"We can only contribute up to 20% of a film's total budget, and with no previous credits newcomers often find it difficult to get international co-financiers to the costs," concludes Karlsdóttir, who joined the institution five years ago, when feature film production started to boom.

The Icelandic showcase took off yesterday (22 June) with the competition screening of Hilmar Oddsson's Tears of Stone, winner of the Audience Award at the 1996 Gothenburg Film Festival. Today (23 June, from 12.30) the Reykjavik Restaurant in Prague will host a press reception and a luncheon to celebrate the extensive participation of the saga island.

The Rack Focus includes Egill Edvardsson's Agnes, about the last women executed in Iceland in 1830, which was selected for last year's Panorama in Berlin, and Gisli Sn r Erlingsson's Benjamin Dove, which, since its Berlinale launch has won prizes at festivals in Poland and Bulgaria. Also in the Berlin programme, Sky Palace was directed by Thorsteinn Jónsson, who received his education at Prague's film school, the FAMU.

Only recently released domestically, Asdís Thoroddsen's Dream Hunters will have its festival debut in Prague. Fridriksson, currently in production with Djöflaeyjan (Devil's Island), is represented by two films, Cold Fever and Movie Days, the latter voted Best Nordic Film in 1994, depicting Iceland in the 60s and his early encounter with moving pictures. Who said Cinema Paradiso was not in Reykjavik ?

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