Having made a big impression with his first ever music video for The Maccabees’ Young Lions, Peter Szewczyk has not directed one for a couple of years. But now he’s made another labour of love for the Icelandic singer ÍRiS’s Swiftly Siren, and the result is a perfectly-formed supernatural thriller. The drama is gripping from the start – with a woman on a beach in the sights of a gunman on the rocks above. But then ÍRiS – as a siren of the rocks – starts to influence the action…

Peter says: “Iris and I tossed a few ideas around, but they never strayed too far from working with the concept of her as a Siren. We flirted with the idea of having more people in competition for her allure, but it was already a pretty full narrative, and I didn’t want to spread our resources too thin. We both immediately liked the twist that a Siren could call both a man and a woman. Also, I was keen from the outset to give the narrative a bit of of a visceral edge, to offset the song’s, slow, measured pace.

“I had loads of fun making my promo for the Maccabees, which was a very run&gun approach to filmmaking. And I really enjoyed making this one – it was a welcome return to fast, guerrilla-style film-making. We shot over 2 1/2 days on a remote beach we randomly found while driving up the coast in Iceland on the morning of the first day. Because of the budget there was literally no crew or equipment. Just the Canon 5D, 2 lenses, and a DSLR cage my dad made!

“The shoot went marvellously and everyone had a blast making it – special thanks to the actors, Guðrún Bjarnadóttir and Bjartur Guðmundsson. I then went home and did the edit, grade and VFX myself over the course a month. We are all quite proud of the way it came together, especially with such limited resources.”

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