Montreal Nouveau 2023 Review: MANNVIRKI, Helping Nature & Art Reclaim Itself

Many of us who live in urban or semi-urban places likely know areas of our city or town where there are a lot of abandoned buildings - sometimes residential, often industrial. We can see small bits of nature reclaiming these spaces (as it should, arguably). But these places can become not just sites of nature reclamation, but sites for art exploration as well.

Icelandic filmmaker Gústav Geir Bollason takes us to just such a site and the somewhat eclectic activities that take place their in his feature debut, Mannvirki. The word means 'structure', and of course as a film title is has several meanings: the place in which the story is set, what occurs therein via the activities of the human interlopers, and the nature surrounding it.

On the north coast of Iceland is an old abandoned fish cannery - the concrete starting to crumble a little, succombing to elements such as water, with lichen covering much of the rooftops and walls. The metal is starting to rust (though luckily most of it can still hold human weight, or this might be a different kind of film). Through this slow-cinema documentary, Bollason follows a few people who seem to be exploring the space and utilizing what they find to make, well, structures.

Are they for art? It seems somewhat, though apart from those who watch the film, it's doubtful this will become a gallery overrun with tourists. We see a man construct a strange object: inside an old tire, hhe has placed large glass jars, half-filled with sand. He rolls the tire across the cannery rooftop - is he just trying something out? Maybe. Will this be taken to civilization or remain remote? Who knows. A woman scrapes the lichen from the roofs and walls, often adds it to a strange, boiling substance. Another spraypaints cracks in the walls, then smears dirt. A man goes out into the water in a canoe, wearing Freddy Krueger-like claws with feathers, as if he is becoming part animal, or a bird searching the sea for a meal. Another sets up rocks to create a path, lining the inside with dirt - a haven for wildlife, perhaps? The dog seems to enjoy the softness in contrast to the rust and concrete around them.

There is almost no dialogue in this film, Bollason instead asking his audience to simple to observe the 'performers' and likely just for the performers to do what they would do regardless of the cameras - they are all simply either creating their art, or making it possible for nature to come back to this structure a little more quickly, or both. A few lines of the poetry of Sjón is read a few times, which puts our minds to thinking about the connections between humans and nature.

Mannvirki contemplative yet deep film, one that allows an audience the space and time to think over what they are seeing, perhaps considering what they might find and contribute in such a space. It oddly, or perhaps not oddly, feels somewhat comforting that such life and purpose can be found in the remote and abandoned places of the world.