The parents have separated but the wife and kids are alright. Anna, a farmer and an artist, has moved on from her sailor husband Magnus, immersing herself in creating, parenting and house-keeping. Magnus is less settled, his trips out at sea a metaphor for the turbulence within him.Icelandic director Hlynur Palmason’s The Love That Remains (2025) is anything but dramatic, at least not in a conventional way. The movie, which can be rented on Prime Video, is not a plot-driven story that explains why Anna (Saga Garoarsdottir) and Magnus (Sverrir Guonason) are no longer together. Rather, the film unfolds as a series of asynchronous episodes in the lives of Anna, Magnus, their daughter, their twin sons and their pet dog Panda.Palmason’s screenplay follows the family over a year, through changing seasons and incidents that are trivial as well as life-altering. The opening visual sets the tone. A crane yanks a roof off a house, exposing the bareness within. But the roof is intact and floats over the house like the giant wings of a bird.There is rupture but continuity too within the family, which has been a single unit for far too long to simply come apart. The family members frequently reunite for dinners and picnics. Anna keeps working on her art, hoping to catch a gallerist’s eye. Magnus tries to get back with Anna ever so often.There is a new horse and then a few more. The rooster watches over his flock. Panda, a source of perennial delight, bounds about. Nothing seems out of place on the surface, but the tensions, between Magnus and Anna, Magnus and his daughter, Anna and her art, are quietly simmering.Through lived-in performances, beautiful visuals and slow pacing, the 109-minute movie gives a vivid sense of what it means to be a family navigating a massive change. Anna’s comfort in her house, which is located on a cliff and is surrounded by the bounty of nature, is contrasted with Magnus’s literally shaky environs. Magnus’s lack of connection with his children yields one of the more explicit moments of conflict.Hlynur Palmason in addition to being a filmmaker is also a visual artist, which shows in compositions that are observational as well as surreal at times. Palmason has shot the film himself on 35mm, producing moments that feel at times like a superior home video.Gentle and poignant, The Love That Remains is one of the more unusual films about a fading marriage. Without resorting to judgement or exposition, Palmason invites viewers into a house that itself is a character, throbbing with activity, warmth and the occasional argument.Another important character is Panda. The gorgeous and remarkably intuitive Icelandic sheepdog – real name Lola and belonging to the director – unsurprisingly in 2025 won the Palm Dog, the sidebar annual award given to canine performers at the Cannes Film Festival.