Short of the Week

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Dark Comedy Markus Rainer Englmair

Milk & Blood

In a small family owned icelandic dairy farm, tensions run high as a lactose intolerant son takes revenge on his verbally abusive father.

Play
Dark Comedy Markus Rainer Englmair

Milk & Blood

In a small family owned icelandic dairy farm, tensions run high as a lactose intolerant son takes revenge on his verbally abusive father.

Milk & Blood

Directed By Markus Rainer Englmair
Produced By Columbia University
Made In Iceland

Milk and Blood is a subtle Icelandic/American dark comedy about a rather devastating occurrence at an Icelandic dairy farm. An appropriately bitter and lactose intolerant son grows increasingly frustrated with his verbally abusive father as her barrages him with insults and wrongly accusing him of intentionally sabotaging their milk. When his father goes too far for his taste, his own aggressive tendencies emerge and he lashes out against him, leading to a high tension yet subtly comedic sequence of events. Who knew so much narrative tension could be built over spilt milk?

Cinematically, Milk and Blood is gift to the eyes. The camera will never tire of the Icelandic landscape. Having spent a great amount of time in Iceland there’s not a moment where its natural awesomeness ceases to amaze me. Or Ridley Scott, for that matter. Milk & Blood director Markus Rainer Englmair does a fantastic job of capturing the breathtaking magnitude of the Icelandic landscape. He perfectly combines the beauty and visual luxury of the land while narratively demonstrating the potential oppression rural isolation can create.

Englmair was a first year MFA student at Columbia University during the making of Milk and Blood. He collaborated with screenwriter and producer Ugla Hauksdóttir, an Icelandic native who set the stage for Englmair to have great ease while shooting the film on location in Iceland. Considering there’s hardly a person in Iceland who doesn’t speak English, the great challenge of directing in a foreign language was certainly alleviated but not cured. Englmair tells us “on set I had two versions of the script. One in Icelandic (written in phonetics) and one in English. My co-writer Ugla who also happened to be my cinematographer (and producer!), helped me out whenever I found myself lost. Directing in a language that I don’t speak made me more aware of other important aspects of directing. The spoken words became secondary to body language, facial expression and intonation.”

This film is a perfect demonstration of the ebbs and flows and blessings and curses of familial permanence. On the one hand, our families are capable of driving us mad and pushing us to our limits. On the other hand our families provide us with the added security that we can, for better or for worse, truly be ourselves. Granted there are always lines that can be crossed, but with family there is a greater potential of ultimate acceptance and forgiveness.