a TRUE LIES “We come from the land of the ice and snow, from the midnight sun where the hot springs blow” “Our first day of shooting was out on a frozen lake—and the ice was cracking the way it’s supposed to in the film, which was very unnerving. It was a pretty extreme way to start a film like this.” In the film, the Skaftafell glacial tongue plays the Himalayan foothills. Other impersonations by <strong>Iceland</strong> include Siberia for Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (in which a fur clad, dog sledding, Russian army duck driving Angelina Jolie surfs the glacial lagoon Jökulsárlon) and the black sands of Japan for Clint Eastwood’s war film duo of Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima. SOUND OF MUSIC The o t h e r wo r l d l y s o u n d s of Björk and Sigur Rós have traveled the world and under the ocean, whether in the BBC’s Planet Earth soundtrack, Children of Men, Vanilla Sky or The Life Aquatic, but they’re not the only ones to have been inspired by the <strong>Iceland</strong>ic landscapes. Bing Crosby sang his ode to a favorite salmon fishing river, “You’ll dream of all that fishing on the Laxa and all those other brawling rivers, Lovely <strong>Iceland</strong>, Land of salmon, Whether you have lost or won, You’ll return again to <strong>Iceland</strong> And the land of the midnight sun.” Led Zeppelin arrived on the island in the mid- 70s to open their tour around <strong>Iceland</strong>, Bath and Germany. Legendary track “Immigrant Song” was written in the country, proudly proclaiming, “We come from the land of the ice and snow, from the midnight sun where the hot springs blow” (the midnight sun was less of an inspiration to Jenna from 30 Rock, who couldn’t shoot her “sexy supernatural thriller, in the vein of Twilight and True Blood” with werewolves due to lack of darkness). Going several steps further, violinist, multi-instrumentalist Eyvind Kang composed an entire experimental album inspired by his childhood in the country, fittingly titling it The Story of <strong>Iceland</strong>. The Stranglers held their Black and White debut party and concert, flying in their own core of British hacks for the event, while the new-wave British band Echo and the Bunnymen posed with the waterfall Gullfoss on the cover of their album Porcupine, echoing the frigid feel of the music on the album. The photographer Brian Griffin, another <strong>Iceland</strong> aficionado, later said of the session, “The sun barely appeared the whole time we were there. To walk, stand up, or just think seemed a massive effort”. Some artists thought it best to stay indoors. Former Sporty-spice, Mel C, shot her video “Never Be the Same Again” entirely at the Blue Lagoon... gym. Her sister in song, Mel B, did get to grips with the rugged beauty of the country, dating local hunk Fjölnir Thorgeirsson during the Spice fame. Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s video for “Today the Sun’s Upon Us” barely steps out of Hótel Borg. Showing their macho chops on the other hand, Take That hit the rocky terrain for the video to come back single “Patience”, foolhardily sporting microphone stands in place of hiking gear. FRIENDS In a s m a l l c o u n t r y , all these visitors don’t go unnoticed. Ever since Led Zeppelin, anyone with 15 minutes of fame and a foreign passport to even remotely enjoy a visit to the island has earned the title “friend of <strong>Iceland</strong>”, Íslandsvinur. From president Bill Clinton, who had a hotdog at the Reykjavík booth Baejarins Bestu, to Harrison Ford, who ate at the Indian restaurant Austurindíafélagid, and from Damon Albarn, who used to own a part of his favorite watering hole Kaffibarinn (and has a house in Reykjavík) to Paris Hilton, who drank <strong>Iceland</strong>ic Glacial water (a drink also favored by Geek-extraordinaire Sheldon in hit sitcom Big Bang Theory). Not to mention Microsoft millionaire Paul Allen, whose yacht floated on the coastal waters of Reykjavík, Gael García Bernal, Natalia Vodianova, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Nick Cave, Mark E. Smith, Bobby Fischer, Al Gore, Kiefer Sutherland, Kiri Te Kanawa, Prince Charles, Swedish King Carl Gustaf, Victoria Abril, Cameron Diaz, Tommy Lee, Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono... For such a little land she sure has plenty of friends. And why wouldn’t she? Distant, northern, volcanic and mysterious, with lava, glaciers, whales and trolls, <strong>Iceland</strong> is abundant in the magic that has entranced its friends and continues to fire the imaginations of the ones that never made it there—as author Jorge Luis Borges put it, “<strong>Iceland</strong> of the seas, How lucky all men are that you exist.” a 20 atlantica
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