Further Information

A documentary about dockworkers
Would you like to jump on board?!

Offloading a factory trawler demands great planning and skills that are impossible for an outsider to imagine. The Icelandic cultural heritage includes "tonns" of songs, paintings and poems that shed light on the lifes of fishermen. This is the first time the vital job of the dockworker is put into the spotlight.

On a cold winter night a factory trawler loaded with frozen fish enters the old harbor of Reykjavík. On board there are 20.000 boxes of frozen fish, each weighing 25 kg. The temperature in the freezing compartment is -35C°. A group of men have only 48 hours to empty the ship before it heads back out to sea. This is no job for wussies. Making one mistake may cost thousands of euros, even the whole budget of this documentary. While they do the impossible, we hear stories of the bright and dark sides of the lives they lead.

Keep Frozen is really a documentary about the human spirit and about overcoming something that is bigger than you.

To the workers that unload Icelandic factory trawlers each job is nothing less than a ritual. It takes a lot of planning, team effort and skills that are impossible for outsiders to imagine. What is more; a big part of the job has to be done manually. Keep Frozen is a film that gives a clear view on this particular process and what it really takes to “do the job”. This documentary is a sneak peak into a real "man´s world".

Keep Frozen was shot during the darkest and coldest months of the Icelandic winter. What we see is the unloading of one particular factory trawler, VIGRI, that has just returned to the harbor after months at sea. The film starts with a full ship and ends with an empty one. All the work is done with amazing speed and team effort. The dominating rhythm is the rhythm of machinery, which is also in the movement of the workers. We experience the rude environment of the workers, their hierarchy and the harsh conditions of work. Voices of different characters tell us personal stories of people, conditions and situations. We hear stories of manhood, coming of age and sacrifices that have been made because of the job. Some have missed the upbringing of their children, limbs have been lost, lives have been lost. How do they communicate with each other while they work? What kind of men choose to do these kind of jobs and why? Why do they accept these working conditions? Many of them have actually chosen this place in life and the job has become a big part of their identity.

A big effort was put into the filming process and the outcome is a powerful and poetic journey through a hidden and disappearing world. This film reflects on historical and cultural change while it also comments on contemporary issues such as relation of man to work andgender ideas.

Keep Frozen has already got funding from The Icelandic Film Fund and will be shown on RUV (The Icelandic National Broadcasting Service). At the end of September Keep Frozen was chosen to take part in the work in progress category at Nordisk Panorama film festival in Sweden. The result of that presentation exeeded our highest hopes and to make a long story short, we now have the distribution contract we dreamed of as well as proposals from vital film festivals.

To be able to finish the film, we need your help!

At the moment we need to raise funding for the post production of the film, including color correction, sound post and more. It also costs a lot to distribute the film and make it visible and accessable to the audience, both here in Iceland and abroad.
We would like to thank you for the time you spent on getting to know our project and we hope you see a reason to jump on board and take part in the financing of Keep Frozen. We believe this is a very important film and we look forward to share it with the world!

A few words on the women behind Keep Frozen:
The team behind Keep Frozen are Helga Rakel Rafnsdóttir producer and Hulda Rós Guðnadóttir director. Together they made The Corner Shop, a documentary that won several prices nationally, The Edda award for best documentary in 2008, The Silver fox at Reykjavík Shorts&Docs, "Einarinn" at the Skjaldborg festival as well as recieving the annual DV-cultural awards in 2009. The Corner Shop was screened at a number of festivals world wide and also screened five times on RUV (The Icelandic National Broadcasting Service). Helga Rakel also produced the award winning documentary Salóme which won the price for best nordic documentary at the long established festival Nordisk Panorama. Salóme also won the DV - cultural awards in 2015.

Director: Hulda Rós Guðnadóttir
Producer: Helga Rakel Rafnsdóttir
Production company: Skarkali
Co-production company: Kukl
Script: Hulda Rós Guðnadóttir, Helga Rakel Rafnsdóttir, Hinrik Þór Svavarsson
DOP: Dennis Helm
Camera: Grímur Jón Sigurðsson
Recording of sound: Bogi Reynisson
Sound post: Huldar Freyr Arnarsson
Music: Joseph Marzolla and Prins póló