At the beginning of the film, three medical students are hunting for a body to use for research purposes. They hear of a tramp that has been found dead. The body is in the mortuary and as no-one seems to know who he is; they decide to take the body for dissection without formal permission. When the body is placed on the operating table, one of the students recognizes the man, and scenes from his acquaintance with the dead man flash back. At the same time certain things begin to happen that they had not allowed for.

A young journalist journeys to Iceland to find her missing fiancé only to encounter a mythical creature who longs to die.

Magnús is a 45-year-old lawyer, whose routine is upset by the personal news that he is suffering from cancer. This causes Magnús to stop and think about himself, his life and his family. If his life is going to end sooner than he expected, he wants to know how much it's been worth to him. Has life been worth living? Is it worth fighting for; is it worth a struggle against death? He takes a look at his family, a group of ordinary people, who are the colourful heroes of everyday life, struggling along in a world far removed from the world of high finance, power politics and international intrigues, but yet to them their lives are lives of high adventure. Those adventures, from the sublime to the ridiculous, form the storyline of the film, told against the background of Magnús' dilemma.

Birta overhears her mother’s phone conversation. She is saying to a friend that, due to her financial problems, she won’t be able to afford the family Christmas. Strong and responsible Birta decides to find a way to raise money but it’s not so easy when you’re only 11 years old.

Set in present-day Reykjavík, Fiasco draws a narrative circle of interconnecting stories in which three members of the Bardal household deal with the secret loves in their lives. Karl, an old age pensioner, is busy chasing after an amnesic old screen legend. Julia, Karl's granddaughter, is torn between a mediocre bank manager and a wild sailor, and tells them both she is pregnant. But is she really? Steingerdur, Julia's mother, has a wild crush on a preacher who has a serious drinking problem, and ends up with a dead stripper in his Jacuzzi. The characters cross each other as the film progresses, until the three interwoven strands of the story finally come together in an explosive and hilarious crescendo full of surprises.

A desperate city slicker engineer cheats his way into a small farming community, pretending to know how to save them by re-financing their slaughterhouse not knowing that he's walking into a local world war of small-town politics and general misbehaving.

Maria is somewhat of a rebel and problem child. Her mother died and her father remarried some awful lady, and Maria isn't happy at all. She takes a drug overdose and winds up in a home for other girls with problems, but the two women who run the place turn out to be not quite the ladies they seemed. Maria knows she can't stay there very long, and starts planning her escape.

Kalli, a young boy living with his mother in the suburbs of Reykjavik, thrives in the world of movies and computer games. When he is sent to spend Christmas with his father's new family up north at an isolated farm, Kalli meets his stepsister, who he does not get along with. Soon he decides to run away, but only to be hit harder by reality and Kalli has to learn how to fight "real life" challenges while encountering imaginary and fictional creatures.

The smell of leather, whiskey and cigars: Two young girlfriends fall in love with the same man, an adventurous young businessman. Missing, forged documents wreak havoc on the lives of everyone involved.