Lamb- Movie Review

Graham Craycraft

Lamb is the directorial debut by director and writer Valdimar Jóhannsson released through the arthouse production company A24. Lamb joins the list of A24 thriller/horror films with others such as Midsommar, The Witch, Ex Machina &c.

Lamb is an Icelandic foreign language film, but the viewer barely notices during the first half of the movie because there are probably less than 100 words said. It is quiet and contemplative with a nod back to the silent movie era. Jóhannsson circles around human loneliness that spirals into despair and eventually desperation. Where does this desperation lead them? Where does it lead any of us? Extended dream sequences tell the audience more about the characters’ emotions than perhaps their dialogue could.

The movie, a pastoral-set thriller, begins with an ambiguous, ominous tone and beautiful shots of dark, snowy, nothingness. Cut to a couple, only a couple, sitting down to Christmas dinner in their home alone in Iceland’s vast countryside. Jóhannsson sets up a foreboding tone from the very beginning that does not let up even through the end credits. The driving plot point is that the Icelandic couple, who spend their days caring for their flock of sheep as well as tending the land, is obviously unable to have children and are desperate for something to complete their lives. There is not much more that can be said about the plot, so I will have to leave it there.

If someone wanted to describe this movie as weird, I would not disagree. It truly does follow in the same A24 vein as movies like Lighthouse and Midsommar. Weird often means original, and like I stated in my previous review of The Green Knight, originality is hard to come by these days. Weird for its own sake, however, is typically a mistake. Be original and if its weird, good. Setting out to be weird is often a sacrifice for meaningful art.

The theme of the movie is ambiguous. As is the beginning and ending. In another article I read in the LA Times Jóhannsson himself is quoted as saying that he has changed his mind about the meaning of the ending many times. This is something I have said before when it comes to great art. The artist surely has a perspective and understanding about what their work means. This does not preclude someone from having a different understanding of the meaning of the work. The important note here is that neither the artist nor the viewer are necessarily wrong. The artist can even say “this scene means X” and a consumer can say “I see it more like Y” and both can be correct. The author, while perhaps having the greatest understanding of his work, does not own the ability to say “this scene means X, and that’s final.” Jóhannsson perfectly expresses this notion in his statement that everyone should walk away with their own viewpoint on the movie and its outcome.

Like Ari Aster and Robert Eggers before him, Jóhannsson joins the ranks of new and exciting story tellers in the cinematic world. 

93/100.