Nikolaj Coster-Waldau and Joe Cole embark on a dangerous expedition in Against the Ice. Based on the true story, the film centers on Danish explorer Ejnar Mikkelsen as he journeys with inexperienced crew member Iver Iversen across Greenland to disprove the United States' claim on the northeast corner of the island.
In time for the film's release, Screen Rant spoke exclusively with director Peter Flinth to discuss Against the Ice, scouting the beautiful Greenland landscapes and encountering their own treacherous weather during the shoot.
Screen Rant: Against the Ice is quite the moving harrowing film, what about it really drew you to the project?
Peter Flinth: Against the Ice is the kind of explorer story that I've liked since I was a kid. I've been fascinated by these people traveling out to unknown parts of the world and I was fascinated about what is driving them. Then when I came across a story about such an experienced explorer that is ending up in the Northeast Greenland together with a totally unexperienced mechanic, I thought that's a great dynamic, the the old guy and the rookie, being under extreme pressure under these conditions.
So how familiar would you say you were with the story of Ejnar and Iversen before signing on for the film?
Peter Flinth: I got to know the story many years ago, but I didn't know about this explorer, Ejnar Mikkelsen or Iver Iversen, it's a pretty unknown part of the exploring history. So I thought that's an advantage to not have a world famous explorer. [Chuckles] It's a story that you have not known outside of Denmark, so I thought, "Okay, let's bring that up and dramatize their expedition." It's based on their real experiences, Mikkelsen himself has written the book, Against the Ice, and we based it on on his writing and on the diary of Iversen, his companion.
Since the dynamic between those two is really so vital to the film story, what was it like looking for the right cast for those two? Obviously, Nikolaj helped cowrite the film and produce it, but what was it like looking for the perfect Iver to go alongside him?
Peter Flinth: From the beginning, of course, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau I thought would be right for it if he liked it and I was lucky that Nikolaj really was thrilled about the story and helped developing the script, then we had to find the right person to be Iver. We were looking around and then very late on we were suggested to take a look at Joe Cole and we thought, "This is so right." So we met on Skype with with Joe and he luckily agreed to join us on this journey, because to me, the warmth and the humor and all of this was brought in to Iver's character by Joe, the way that he plays optimistic and a little naive for his first expedition in Greenland.
What was it like location scouting for this one? Because the snowy landscapes and frozen ocean is just such a beautiful sight.
Peter Flinth: What we did to find the right location was we started to do a research trip up the north coast in the footsteps of Mikkelsen himself. So we were actually up on the very northeast coast of Greenland where, believe it or not, the hut that they built from the shipwreck is still lying there after 110 years because of the dry air and the cold conditions.
So we were in this little hut realizing, "Oh my god, the two guys have been here for three years." You have this massive landscape and we photographed and filmed it and then we found more accessible places in Greenland to shoot and we have Iceland also standing in as the Greenland locations.
What would you say were some of the biggest challenges for you really capturing that survivalist feel to this expedition?
Peter Flinth: It was to get out there on the glacier every morning and you have to realize that in the wintertime, you don't have much daytime, so we had to transport the whole crew out on the glacier in the morning and then we had only five hours of daylight to shoot there and then get back to the cabin.
One day, we really had to be careful, we had to be evacuated from the glacier because there was a storm coming in. People were flying around, I'm not kidding, it was really hectic. [Chuckles] We had to count everyone on the crew and bring them down four by four in big super Jeeps and stuff, so it was sometimes pretty rough up there.
Sounds like you can make a whole documentary about your own experience, write a diary for the next person to make a film on it. So the bear scene was so well executed, it obviously reminded me a lot of The Revenant with Leo, but what was it like putting that scene together and then seeing it come together afterwards?
Peter Flinth: Yeah, we made a bet and then the guy who lost had to be the stampee and then we put in a real polar bear. [Laughs] No, we really carefully choreography the scene and we had to get the help from a CGI-created polar bear. But the the guy who's shaking around Nikolaj, he's doing all of this and himself was big, he's a world champion stunt man. He was pretty rough with Nikolaj and maybe I was doing too many takes on it, because after that day, Nikolaj was really shaken.
As one probably would be from a bear attack.
Peter Flinth: Also, the costumes they're wearing, they're not costumes, they're replicates of the clothing that they actually had in those days.They're warm, they're practical, but they're very heavy, so when Nikolaj gets into the water and Joe Cole has to pull him up, we suddenly understood how heavy it is. So a lot of the shoot was very physically exhausting.
Against the Ice is now streaming on Netflix.