Sigur Ros

By Contessa Abono and Nadine Caouette

Twinkling lights yielded to snowy icecaps, as the wondrous eyes of children gave way to bright-red kites flying against the blue cloud-filled sky.
Over 500 people packed the Mezzanine Monday, November 19, to view the Icelandic band Sigar Ros's new film Heima, which documents their homeland summer tour of Iceland in 2006.
The film gave fresh perspective to a country many have yet to see with their own eyes. Footage of streams, rivers, oceans, fog and raindrops were played back in reversed to give the illusion of turning back the clock.
The film meaning "at home" or "homeland" was shot in a documentary style by Dean DeBlois. Sigur Ros myspace.com blog states, "In the event, the open-door policy worked amazingly well, with people of all ages, who would never have normally bought a ticket for a Sigur Ros show, just coming along to check it out. As the tour went round it gained a semi-mythical status."
High contrast and saturation, with foreground images that popped out and made you feel like you were there, the film incorporated the town life into the music and used an earthquake-shaking-effect when the band talked about the music industry, "the music biz is left overseas," said Drummer Orri P áll Dýrason, when talking about their worldly fame.

The film captured the day-to-day lives of the Icelanders, and had a special focus on child-like innocence, possibly to foreshadow the films take on the future of Iceland. It seemed as though they were sending out a message about globalization and how Iceland likes to be their own community.
Sigur Ros could also be sending out a message about global warming with the numerous shots of ice melting.
The film was free-admission, and is being shown in movie houses around the world. The band is giving back to their fans, a more recent trend in music for the 2007 year. For example Radiohead is now letting you set the price for their latest album sold only on their website www.inrainbows.com.
The culture and imaginative gusto of the filmmakers and band alike gave a deeper meaning to Iceland and Sigur Ros's music.
Longtime Sigur Ros fan Shelly Booth attended Monday nights screening. This was her seconded time seeing the film, "The first time that I saw Heima in L.A. it was purely a sensory experience." said Booth. "I left speechless. I knew that it was amazing, but I had to see it again to make sense of what I had felt about the film."
For more information on Sigur Ros visit www.sigur-ros.co.uk or for more information about the film go to www.heimafilm.com.