The Garden

Icelandic woman Indíana suffers two major setbacks in a row. First her beloved laburnum tree must be removed on orders of the Ministry of Environment. Then her only son starts dating a foreign girl. Beautiful tragicomedy, superbly acted, with patches of outright hilarity.

Indíana lives alone in an apartment in a bleak neighbourhood. She loves her little garden, especially her award-winning laburnum tree. What she hates is noise from the upstairs neighbours. And their foreign cooking smells. In fact, she hates all foreigners full stop. Luckily there’s her disabled but extremely positive upstairs neighbour Johanna. And her only son Unnar, who dreams of being a first responder. A dream complicated by the fact that from childhood on, Indíana has falsely claimed he’s disabled to swindle the social services.

Now, two separate developments upend Indíana’s life enormously. First a man from the Ministry of Environment informs her that her laburnum tree must go because it’s not native Icelandic. And then Unnar comes home with his new girlfriend Daniela, who is Polish. Indíana makes it her mission to drive them apart.