Critics reviews

Rúnarsson's Sparrows packed an emotional wallop because the arrested development it illustrated didn't simply critique misogyny or stage resistance. Everything potentially redeeming in the film disappears, from its only agential female character (Ari's grandmother, who dies early in the film), to Ari's beautiful singing voice, the echoes of which are lost inside an empty oil drum.

Rúnarsson is observant and captures the posturing of teenage boys particularly well, all the time showing how a lack of parental support — or even old-fashioned good example — can lead to crisis for a youngster.

Hushed sensitivity is the order of the day in this measured, moving mini-bildungsroman, which sees Runarsson carrying over the observational exactitude and majestic sense of place that distinguished his strong 2011 debut "Volcano." If, for all its stately virtues, "Sparrows" isn't quite the step forward that might have been expected from the helmer's follow-up, this outwardly conventional coming-of-ager rewards viewers' patience.

The land of the midnight sun lends this coming-of-age story a nice bleary texture, and second-time director Rúnarsson is every bit as attentive to the interiors of the fishing village—crappy wood-panelled homes strewn with empty bottles—as to the magnificent landscapes outside. That said, in spite of its artfully slow pace Sparrows is bustling with cliché.

A rather conventional coming-of-age drama bolstered by handsome visuals and a highly unique setting, Sparrows (Prestir) marks a solid if often predictable sophomore feature from Icelandic writer-director Runar Runarsson.