Synopsis
An Icelandic couple live with their herd of sheep on a beautiful but remote farm. When they discover a mysterious newborn on their land, they decide to keep it and raise it as their own. This unexpected development and the prospects of a new family brings them much joy before ultimately destroying them.
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Cast
- Noomi RapaceMaría
- Hilmir Snær GuðnasonIngvar
- Björn Hlynur HaraldssonPétur
- Ingvar E. SigurðssonCreature
- Ester BibiWoman
- Sigurður Elvar ViðarsonTruck Driver
- Theodór Ingi ÓlafssonMan
- Arnþruður Dögg SigurðardóttirWoman 2
- Gunnar Þor KarlssonBus Driver
- Lára Björk HallAda (voice)
Recommendations
- 80
IGN
Lamb is a wonderfully strange film about parenthood. - 75
IndieWire
Lamb takes a low-key minimalist approach to its premise that invites a certain shock-and-awe reaction before doubling back to give it purpose. - 75
The A.V. Club
This intimate, four-character film has its own quiet rhythms, compatible with yet distinct from any perceived A24 house style. It’s a hybrid of unnerving, dread-based horror and genuine domestic drama. Are they naturally so different, anyway? - 75
Consequence
Lamb takes on the ominous, warning air of an old fable, the kind of pre-Grimm fairy tale meant to threaten the gullible with punishment for transgressing against the natural order of things. And in that respect, it’s a mighty debut, one worthy to see what else Jóhannsson has to offer. - 70
The Hollywood Reporter
Lamb is a disturbing experience but also a highly original take on the anxieties of being a parent, a tale in which nature plus nurture yields a nightmare. - 70
Screen Daily
The brilliantly sustained mood and matter-of-fact absurdity of Valdimar Jóhannsson’s impressive debut is slightly let down by a pay-off which doesn’t entirely land. Still, the majority of the picture is strong enough to satisfy audiences with a taste for folk horror oddities, even if the ending isn’t quite as punchy as one might have anticipated. - 70
Variety
No matter how pure your intentions nor how real your pain, these ancient myths all teach us, debts always come due, and the chilling denouement of Jóhannsson’s dark, deliberate debut suggests that is what Lamb is: a modern-day take on some ancient, pre-Disneyfication fairy tale or a nursery rhyme with a sinister history encoded into its Spartan melody. - 63
Movie Nation
Whatever transpires or is left unexplained, Jóhannsson never loses track of the mood he sets out to establish, that of a frosty folk tale that suggests that not everything we do to cope with grief is healthy, acceptable and should be dressed up as a little girl.
