The Day Iceland Stood Still | Film Talk with President of Iceland Halla Tómasdóttir and Pat Mitchell

On Thursday, May 22, Scandinavia House had the honor of hosting President of Iceland Halla Tómasdóttir and award-winning journalist Pat Mitchell for a conversation about Icelandic documentary THE DAY ICELAND STOOD STILL. Tómasdóttir discussed her recollections of the historical events in the film and their relevance today following a matinee screening. When 90 percent of the women of Iceland walked off the job and out of their homes one fall morning in 1975 refusing to work, cook, or take care of the children, they brought their country to a standstill and catapulted Iceland to the “best place in the world to be a woman.” Told for the first time by the women themselves, and laced with playful animation, THE DAY ICELAND STOOD STILL is subversive and unexpectedly funny. “We loved our male chauvinist pigs,” recalls one of the activists, “We just wanted to change them a little!” Filmed in a collaboration between U.S. director Hogan, who campaigned as a high school student in the 1970s with her activist mother to pass the Equal Rights Amendment, and Icelandic producer Hrafnhildur Gunnarsdóttir, who at the age of seven accompanied her mother to the 1975 strike, the film features appearances by celebrities such as former Icelandic president Vigdís Finnbogadóttir, the world’s first democratically elected female head of state, as well as music by Björk. Released in the lead-up to the strike's 50th anniversary in 2025, the film's message about the collective power of women to transform their society inspires viewers to reimagine the impossible. This program was presented in the Curtis L. Carlson Distinguished Lecture Series. ABOUT THE SPEAKERS HALLA TÓMASDÓTTIR is an Icelandic former businesswoman and politician serving as the seventh president of Iceland since 2024. She is Iceland's second female president, after Vigdís Finnbogadóttir. Before becoming president, she was the chief executive of The B Team, a global nonprofit group. She has an international MBA from Thunderbird School of Global Management and has lived and worked in the U.S., the UK and across the Nordics. Throughout her career as an award-winning journalist, producer and media executive, PAT MITCHELL broke new ground for women, including as the first woman president of PBS and of CNN Productions. Today, Pat is a co-founder, host and curator for TEDWomen and co-founder of Connected Women Leaders, a cohort of global women leaders who launched a global campaign for climate justice, Project Dandelion. She serves on the boards of the Sundance Institute, The Skoll Foundation, The Woodruff Arts Center, and the VDAY movement to end gender-based violence; she’s also a member of CARE’s Global Advisory Council, the Smithsonian American Women's History Museum, and Chair Emerita of the Women’s Media Center which established an annual award in her name. She is the author of BECOMING A DANGEROUS WOMAN: EMBRACING RISK TO CHANGE THE WORLD.