Mads Mikkelsen: Northern Star

“I lost 15 pounds in two weeks,” states Den - mark’s finest export. “It was devastating, the toughest thing I have ever done. But it’s also a gift as you don’t have to pretend. If you are completely physically drained, your emotions tend to be right below the surface of the skin. It’s all there.”

Photo: Kenneth Willardt

This is Mads Mikkelsen in forthright form. Courteous, direct and open, Mikkelsen, the man, is several dimensions away from many of the complex, anguished characters he has played in his career. Widely acknowledged as one of the finest European actors of his generation, Mikkelsen is colorfully describing to me, day-by-day, the grueling 22-day film shoot in Iceland of gripping survival saga Arctic. Despite the, at times, vivid descriptions of what transpired on the shoot and having to deal with the worst weather Iceland could throw at them at the same time, Mikkelsen’s reflections on making the film come with often unexpected clusters of chuckles undercut with dashes of dry Danish humor.

COOL AT CANNES

Arctic is the debut feature of 31-year old Brazilian director Joe Penna and is the story of a crashed pilot Overgård, played by Mikkelsen, stranded in an unknown stretch of Arctic wilderness that is at once extremely isolated, ethereal and deadly. Initially alone, a botched rescue attempt brings Overgård to save an unknown young woman, played by Icelandic actor Maria Thelma Smáradóttir. Overgård subsequently attempts to save them both from their terrible predicament by scaling frozen mountains and cliffs. This all while dragging the woman on an improvised sled. Arctic was part of the Official Selection for the 2018 Cannes Film Festival this May. The film received a 10-minute standing ovation when it had a midnight screening.

In September this year, Mikkelsen was the guest of honor at the Reykjavík International Film Festival, where he received the festival’s prestigious Creative Excell ence Award. Mikkelsen has a close connection with Iceland. He shot his first feature film here, a Danish film Vildspor (Wildside,1998). “Arctic is actually my third time filming here,” he says, “and I shot parts for Rogue One (2016) in Iceland.”

ROUGH SHOOTING

Arctic arrives in the wake of two Hollywood blockbusters Mikkelsen starred in, superhero film Doctor Strange (2016), where he played the villain Kaecilius and Star Wars spin-off Rogue One. Dr. Strange was a tough shoot with filming in locations such as Nepal, but how did the filming Arctic in Iceland compare? “There is nothing that compares to it,” says Mikkelsen: “It was the toughest thing I have ever done in my life. The conditions were overwhelming. Our worst enemy and our biggest ally was nature.”

MYSTERIOUS CHARACTERS

Very little is revealed about either Overgård or the young woman’s past. “Most characters have a clear background,” explains Mikkelsen. “For this one it was difficult.” Smáradóttir spends the entire film in a state of mute semi-consciousness, and her life is revealed only tantalizingly in a family photograph that Overgård is determined to salvage for her. “Little things like that indicate that he has someone back home too,” he says.

Overgård is a complete enigma. A pilot, it is only through his relationship, albeit one sided, with the young woman that facets of Overgård’s personality are revealed in occasional dramatic but discrete flashes: “For Arctic, we felt that the more information there was, the more we would narrow it down to a specific person. It was deliberate that we did not want to go down that path. Joe and I discussed Overgård’s job, his life, his family situation and agreed that we did not want to put that into the film.”

The puzzle at the heart of Overgård’s character stylistically evokes what British novelist Graham Greene once described as: “The sliver of ice that runs through the heart.” The mystery is even more seductive given that Mikkelsen rarely speaks in the film.

“It is a tricky thing,” he says. “When you read the script, which I loved, you think ‘Yeah, that’s a walk in the park, I don’t have to learn 200 lines every day’ but it’s not that easy. Language, one of the biggest tools for you as an actor, is taken away, so you have to figure out what to compensate with here.” There was also the even greater challenge that for a significant portion of the film, Overgård’s character is entirely on his own. “You can fall into the trap of boring yourself, and you want to produce something,” the actor acknowledges adding that he approached this obstacle with strict creative discipline, which if anything, subtly emphasizes Mikkelsen’s extraordinary capability and range as an actor: “The mere fact that you want to produce something is a bad signal, a bad sign. You have to really wake up and say, ‘Hold your horses, you cannot do this to make me happy.’ It must be honest to the film. There is a fine line that you have to watch all the time.”

SURVIVAL AND HUMANITY

Mikkelsen loves making films because it is utterly goal-orientated. Despite this he reiterates to me, almost addressing the fact as a lesson, that “the process is constant, always constant” and that it is teamwork that holds a project together. “At the end of each day when we wrap and have dinner, we talk about what we did, what we’re going to do tomorrow and assure each other that we’re on the right track,” he says. “I rarely get super-surprised when the film is finished and say, ‘Oh my god this film turned out to be something completely different.’”

For Mikkelsen, the theme of survival in Arctic is universal and could apply as much in a bustling city as in the Arctic tundra. “We wanted it to be a story that we could all relate to,” he explains. “I grew up watching a lot of films and listened to a lot of radio theater with my brother,” he says. “We did all the voices, and I think we were subconsciously fascinated with that world, but like other kids we didn’t want to be that actor, we wanted to be that character on screen.” Mikkelsen’s heroes in his youth were legendary martial artist Bruce Lee and silent film star Buster Keaton: “I was fascinated by them both. You could tell an awful lot about what was going on inside of them just by looking at them. Although it was a little hard to read exactly what they were expressing, it was never boring to watch. When they would finally smile, the entire sky would open.”

BADDIES AND BÊTE NOIRES

It is for playing villains that Mikkelsen is perhaps most widely known. His breakthrough performance which turned him into an international name was as the Bond villain Le Chiffre in Casino Royale, one of the best-regarded Bond films, opposite Daniel Craig and Eva Green. Mikkelsen turned Ian Fleming’s Le Chiffre into a compulsively watchable character, a complex, vulnerable villain. With the success of Hannibal, Mikkelsen has established himself as a major Hollywood talent but does he ever feel pigeonholed cast as the European villain? “Not a bit,” he says. “That is more of a journalist’s approach,” he asserts. “Actors don’t put them into boxes like ‘Baddies’ and ‘Goodies.’” Even Hannibal? “We see them as interesting characters and if it turns out they do something terrible then hopefully we’ll find the human side to the reason why they are doing it,” reflects Mikkelsen with more than a sliver of passion rising in his voice. “I always say that to play the villain you have to find something likable at least and a mission that people can relate to. If you play the good guy, you’ll have to find the flaws and all the cracks in the armor. It is not such a big difference.”

BEER AND ICELANDERS

Mikkelsen’s current appearances in advertising campaigns for Carlsberg have achieved something of a cult status that has drawn inevitable comparisons with Blade Runner (1982) actor Rutger Hauer’s role in the iconic Guinness commercials from the late 80s and early 90s. A beer aficionado, Mikkelsen has sampled local Icelandic tipples on his visits here. “I just generally like beer,” he says, dryly.

As a Scandinavian, and particularly as a Dane, the actor has a strong kinship with Iceland. “I feel a strong connection,” he says. “Obviously there is a strong history, particularly between Denmark and Iceland as it was ruled by the Danes for many centuries. They have a sort of love/hate relationship with the Danes, but we have a lot in common.”

Iceland remains Mikkelsen’s favorite country. “It is absolutely astonishing how it looks, this kind of spiritual feeling that is seeping through nature,” adding that this spirit is part of the people that live here. “They are amazing people, so proud and embracing. It feels like home every time I come here.” Mikkelsen only stopped over for two days to pick up his award at RIFF but assures me he will return. “Iceland is a place where you want to stay for some time,” he concedes. “It’s in everyday life that you figure out how Icelandic people are. And they are very different from the rest of us.”

Arctic will be released in the US and Iceland in February 2019.

Text by Christopher Kanal Photos: Helen Sloan courtesy of Pegasus Pictures, and Shutterstock.com Cover photo: Kenneth Willardt