“Lamb”: Silence of the Lamb

There are looks that speak volumes that Ingvar and Maria throw at each other. The couple, who raise sheep in the beautiful, natural expanses of Iceland, have given birth to a lamb. But something surprises her.

Maria, played by Noomi Rapace (“Verblendung”, “Prometheus”) takes it with her to her remote house. She will pull out an old crib and watch it in it like a mother watching her sleeping baby. Ingvar, played by the native Icelander Hilmir Gudnason, will hold it and heart it like a father.

The longer, the more intimate this love triangle grows, the more remote and strange the atmosphere feels, with which Valdimar Johannsson quietly floods his feature film debut. The initially out-of-the-ordinary picture of a couple caring for an animal like a baby may be upsetting on their own. But it tips into a cinematic narrative that is second to none.

Because the new life that they call Ada carries the head of a lamb on the body of a growing human being who shows no signs of beginning to speak.

Secluded misfortune

A fact that one would ascribe to a visually wacky, trashy-futuristic horror. Or locate it in that sub-genre that understands both abysmal and bloody adaptations of old folk tales. But up to this point, Johansson had created such a coherent and clear environment, thanks in part to his ability to do special effects, which has been awarded the European Film Prize, that everything seems to be right: a secluded world of extraordinary happiness.

Except for the fact that Ingvar’s brother (Björn Haraldsson) bleats in the quietly gliding country life: “This is sick!”. While the human trio negotiates old pain and new acceptance, Johannsson cleverly spreads a question full of unease about Iceland’s Oscar entry: How sick is it of people to take from nature because they can simply do it?

“Lamb” in all its tenderness becomes the ultimate hard parable of crude ecology as well as family property issues. Who does a child belong to anyway?

Whom Ada? The answer that “Lamb” finds can be roughly described as follows: If one had to find a picture of those terrifying, silent lambs, of whom Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster) once wrote Dr. Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) said this film already had it. In the finale, it also helps over the fact that one of the most fascinating horror films of 2021 sometimes runs out of air despite the big drama.

„Lamb“: ISL / S / PL 2021 106 Min.

OÖN rating:

The trailer for the film:

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