The circuit of film festivals that comes around this time of year is already well underway. Among them includes the Reykjavik Film Festival, which just wrapped a few days ago. 

Based in Iceland, the film festival partakes in the usual fashion that most film festivals are akin to, yet it still manages to find new ways to highlight its own location. 

Super Happy Forever, coming out of Japan, took home the Golden Puffin award following its screening. Directed and co-written by Igarashi Kohei, Super Happy Forever, starring Hiroki Sano and Nairu Yamamoto, sees a man return to a resort to rekindle the emotions of when he was there years earlier, which saw him fall in love with his wife. 

Past winners of the Golden Puffin have been films such as The Death Of Mr. Lazarescu, from Romania, and Twilight Portrait, out of Russia.  

Despite the normal events of the festival, the event organizers try to find new and creative ways to bring the movies to their guests, and to keep their guests coming to the fest. 

According to Variety, the director of the festival, Hrönn Marinósdóttir, said, “We try to do strange things, we have swim-ins, drive-ins, an ice cave cinema, just to appeal to different kinds of people.” 

Variety also notes that the festival itself strives to retain many Icelandic traits, and looks to reflect where the fest is held. 

The festival itself comes along as Iceland is beginning to become a hotspot for filming locations for a slew of different projects, and Marinósdóttir herself noted that it’s an ideal place for people to meet. Even past projects, such as Game Of Thrones, utilized spots in Iceland when filming its scenes.  More specifically, locales like the Thorufoss waterfall were used in season four of the show, among many other locations within Iceland. 

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