Ice ice baby
Synthetic Cinema’s Hallmark movie shoots: From southeastern Connecticut to Iceland
Film fans around here — particularly devotees of Hallmark and Lifetime movies — know Synthetic Cinema International well.
The company, based in Rocky Hill, has shot in southeastern Connecticut with such productions as “Holiday for Heroes,” which aired on Hallmark; and “A Very Nutty Christmas” with Melissa Joan Hart, and “Wishin' and Hopin',” based on Wally Lamb's novel, both of which were televised on Lifetime.
While it has distributed its movies abroad before, Synthetic has now truly gone international.
It has filmed for the first time out of the U.S. — in Iceland. The result, “Love on Iceland,” will debut on the Hallmark Channel at 9 p.m. Jan. 18.
Synthetic co-founder and producer Andrew Gernhard, a Norwich native who lives in Gales Ferry, came up with the idea of filming in Iceland when he and his now-wife, Christy, traveled there two years ago to see the Northern Lights. Gernhard thought the visually striking country would be a wonderful site to shoot a romantic-getaway movie. Hallmark executives liked the idea of shooting a film in Iceland; Synthetic pitched a variety of ideas for the storyline, and Hallmark wanted to combine a couple of them.
In the resulting movie, a group of college friends decides to get together about 10 years after graduating and take a trip to Iceland. One of them, Chloe, produces podcasts; a woman she interviewed for one podcast had said that Iceland was a magical place, hence the decision for that to be the travel destination. Chloe didn't invite her ex-boyfriend (now a celebrated photographer) on this reunion trip, but someone else did.
The stars are Kaitlin Doubleday, whose TV credits include playing Rhonda Lyon on “Empire” and Jessie Caine on “Nashville,” and Colin Donnell, who was Tommy Merlyn in “Arrow,” Scotty Lockhart in “The Affair” and Dr. Connor Rhodes on “Chicago Med.”
Patti Murin, who played the lead character's pal and co-worker in “Holiday for Heroes” and was Anna in Broadway's “Frozen,” appears in “Love on Iceland” as well.
The movie is directed by Clare Niederpruem, who also helmed “Holiday for Heroes” a year ago in southeastern Connecticut.
Major motion pictures
Synthetic was hardly the only film crew working in Iceland; the rugged,
otherworldly landscape of the country has made it a popular locations for sci-fi flicks.
When Synthetic first arrived in the country, word had it that Will Ferrell was filming there (for the Netflix project “Eurovision”), and so was George Clooney (reportedly doing the post-apocalyptic drama “Good Morning, Midnight”). While working on “Love on Iceland,” Gernhard met the body double for Chris Pratt, who was shooting the sci-fi film “The Tomorrow War” at the same time in Iceland.
Location, location, location
“Love on Iceland” shot in a lot of amazing locations, including the Secret Lagoon hot springs and the bubble hotels where people can sit inside what looks like a bubble and gaze up at the Northern Lights.
Gernhard says the movie has the Hallmark feel but seems grander in scope because of the epic Iceland scenery. They filmed in ice caves, which are about 3 miles away from civilization, Gernhard recalls.
“Our first day was two helicopters bringing cast and crew in the middle of a glacier to these ice caves. So it just logistically was crazy,” he says.
They hit 21 locations during the 15-day shoot.
“We did everything. We did waterfalls, ice caves, glaciers, chalets, downtown Reykjavik. I mean, we basically toured all of Iceland. Iceland is beautiful in (the movie),” he says.
“The actors did an amazing job. I’m definitely looking forward to the audience’s reaction to this.”
Gernhard says that while film crews have the same general responsibilities no matter the city or country, they all work a little differently.
“The thing about Iceland, all they have there are huge movies — it’s like ‘Star Wars,’ all these big Apple-TV, sci-fi epics — so I think everybody there is super trained. They were like a SWAT team,” he says.
Discussing how “Love on Iceland” compares with past Synthetic productions, Gernhard says, “I think it’s well above the level of what a TV movie is.
“And as far as what we’ve done, this is almost a whole new level of production. It seems very big, and I think people will get that right away. I’d have to say this is probably in my top three favorite movies we’ve done.”
Weather issues
The weather was surprisingly decent during the filming. Only three days were bitterly cold, Gernhard says, while the rest of the time was warmer than in Connecticut.
“The Icelanders couldn’t believe that we got through 15 days without any weather problems,” he says. “We caught luck every day, that’s basically what happened. And I don’t know that that can ever be repeated.”
Like Connecticut, Iceland has different weather patterns, but they are even more extreme. Gernhard recalls how, at the hotel where they were staying, the wind was so strong it almost picked up the car.
He thought they wouldn’t be able to shoot that day. But the location, which was just 10 minutes down the road, was sunny and beautiful.
While the weather cooperated, Mother Nature still had her way when it came to sunrise and sunset. When Gernhard got to Iceland in October for preproduction, there were about seven hours of daylight. By the time the filming wrapped in December, there were only about four hours of daylight.
“We had to shoot fast and plan the schedule to shoot when we had daylight so the movie wasn’t completely a midnight movie,” he says with a laugh.
“Luckily, a lot of the scenes were interior, which you could fake (to make it seem like) day, because you put the lights out front.”
The result, he says, is gorgeous: “It’s a nice mix of daylight and nighttime. Everybody is dressed in these cozy outfits, there’s fires going, there’s candles going. It’s lit perfectly so the night looks beautiful and cozy.”
Some scenes are so stunning, they almost look fake, he says.
“In Connecticut, the beautiful time is the magic hour in the morning and at night when the sun is golden. … Iceland is like that for the entire time of daylight (at the time of year we were shooting). The sun comes up, and it stays on the edge of the horizon until it goes down. It never goes overhead, never goes to the side,” he says.
More movies to come
Synthetic plans to pitch more international locations in the future. The company also has some ideas for movies that could be shot in Connecticut.
“It’ll get down to what is manageable and what is actually going to happen,” Gernhard says. “Some stuff will happen (in 2021). It just depends on where the cards fall.”