Just as a large ferry comes to dock at the port of Seyðisfjörður, Iceland, the torso of a body is recovered from the sea by local fishermen. Who’s body is it, and was the person killed and dismembered on the ship? Mixed with this murder mystery, the ten-part series begins with a flashback to seven years earlier when a fire destroys an abandoned factory and kills a young woman. Her boyfriend, Hjörtur, who briefly left her alone there, has since been regarded as the perpetrator of the fire even though he was badly burnt in his attempt to rescue her.

Making things more complex, a storm blows in trapping the ferry and the township from physical contact with the outside world. A crime investigation team can’t fly in from Reykjavik, so the local chief of police, Andri Olafsson, and two junior officers attempt to track down the murderer. Their task isn’t made any easier when the torso is stolen, and their prime suspect proves to be a handful when he is locked in the small local jail.

In the ever-increasing storm that encases these characters, the plot slithers around like a python at a pole dancing competition. There is the storyline about the port being expanded to become a stopping off point for Chinese cruise ships, making the local politicians and businessmen giddy with the prospect of fat profits. Their greedy plans are being scuppered by Guðmundur a local man who doesn’t want to sell his land for this development, and not surprisingly this leads to fatal consequences.

Rögnvaldur a wheelchair-bound man, watches many of the events in the township through his telescope, which is suggestive of Hitchcock’s Rear Window. Then there is the ferry captain, Soren Carlsen, who isn’t very helpful with the murder investigation because he is involved with a Lithuanian people smuggling gang, and, of course, Andri’s home life is nearly as complicated as the murder investigation.

The town trapped by storms and secrets is a marvellous setting for a killer on the loose story. Andri (Ólafur Darri Ólafsson) is a great bear of a man who strides through the frozen landscape using all his physical and mental strength to cope with this living nightmare. As a viewer, you have to be equally up to the task of following all the plotlines, made more difficult for those of us who have to read the sub-titles, but it’s well worth it.

TRAPPED / CERT: 15 / STARRING: ÓLAFUR DARRI ÓLAFSSON, IIMUR KRISTJANSDOTTIR, INGVAR EGGERT SIGUROSSON, NINA DOGG FILIPPUSDOTTIR / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW