Sheep are not harmless. Usually.
We like to sample foreign, unsung movies for our holiday movies. Sometimes, this leads to disaster, but sometimes, such as with the Finnish Rare Exports (2010), we have a rollicking good time.
Lamb (2021, Icelandic: Dýrið) falls midway between the two extremes.
Ingvar and Maria are a married couple, farming an isolated plot of land, whose children passed away, and their lack of offspring weighs on them.
Heavily.
So when a child appears in their sheep flock, they name her Ada and raise her as their own. Told in a spare, quiet style that I tend, accurately or not, to associate with European movies, it dances on the tightwire over the sea of vapidity, and mostly retains its balance; watchers will only scratch their heads two or three times as the pair, and a later addition of mysterious Pétur, brother to Ingvar, care for swiftly growing Ada.
And then, one day, Ada’s father shows up, and he has no patience for nonsense. He has such an abrupt manner that, oddly enough, when Maria discovers the results of the unnamed father’s return, I half expected her to dab blood under her eyes and assume the guise of Frigg, wife of Odin, before taking vengeance.
No such luck.
Not having any sort of Icelandic background, this was an interesting peek into the Icelandic psyche and mythic landscape, but it does take patience and curiosity. Good luck.
