Where do I even start? When I first saw the trailer for Lamb I was, like most people, wildly intrigued. It’s being put out by A24, and I love a weird movie with a catchy Beach Boys Tune in the trailer. I was in. Going into the film, I knew Lamb was going to be a wild and weird ride, but what I didn’t know was that it would be a sluggish one as well.
LAMB MOVIE REVIEW
Co-Written by Sjó and Valdimar Jóhannsson (who then also directed the film), Lamb tells the story in 3 Acts of a husband and wife (Noomi Rapace and Hilmir Snær Guðnason) who are sheep farmers. After the loss of their child, María (Rapace) and Ingvar (Guðnason) are in mourning. But, on one strange day, one of their sheep gives birth to a half lamb/half-human baby whom the couple then treats as their own child.
While underneath the absurdity lies a heart-wrenching story of love, life, and mourning the film takes an incredibly long time to get there. The story is also muddied by an unclear romance(?) between María and Ingvar’s brother, Pétur. Whether they had an affair in the past, or if he’s just normally this inappropriate with his advances towards his brother’s wife is unclear. Instead of telling her husband what is going on, María does what, unfortunately, a lot of women do is keep quiet to keep the peace and deal with it herself. Personally, I feel this entire storyline takes away from the overall strength and arc of María’s character and who she becomes by the end.
IS IT A HORROR STORY?
Lamb is also billed as a supernatural horror film, which it is not. Just because a film has a monster doesn’t make it a horror movie. Would anyone consider Twilight to be a horror movie because it has vampires? Absolutely not. Twilight is a YA drama. Lamb is a drama film that just happens to have a monster…eventually. Unless you want to count Pétur as a human monster, but even then not a horror movie let alone a supernatural one.
Overall, I found the performances to be spectacular. Rapace and Guðnason tackle this film with ease and heart, and she is absolutely heartbreaking. The film is shot beautifully in the countryside of Iceland, and I think the story overall is powerful. However, everything in between is lacking.
