Ragnar Bragason

Ragnar Bragason is one of Iceland's most popular and critically acclaimed filmmakers of the younger generation. He is best known for his twin feature-films Börn (Children) and Foreldrar (Parents) and the popular TV series trilogy Næturvaktin (The Night Shift), Dagvaktin (The Day Shift), and Fangavaktin (The Prison Shift). Ragnar, born 15th of September 1971, grew up in the village of Sudavik and started out making short films in college. After directing a large number of music videos for both local and international artists, he made his first feature-film Fíaskó (Fiasco) in 2000. In his work Ragnar uses methods similar to those of Mike Leigh and John Cassavetes of working with actors to create characters and screenplays through improvisation. His work has been nominated numerous times for The EDDA Annual Film & TV Awards in Iceland and has received the awards 24 times. Fíaskó was awarded Special Jury Prize at the Cairo International Film Festival in 2000. Börn won the Golden Swan for Best film at Copenhagen International Film Festival in 2007 and the award for Best Direction at the Transilvania International Film Festival in 2007.