Lamb (2021) Review: An Underwhelming Bizarre Folktale!

A24’s fantastically edited trailer of their new “horror” film Lamb, featuring the song God Only Knows accompanied by strange images of human parents with a hybrid lamb-human, quickly caught my attention. Having seen around seven A24 horror films, I have enjoyed four of them, including Midsommar, The Blackcoat’s Daughter, The Witch, and The Hole in the Ground.

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I was curious to see if Lamb would rank among these films as opposed to falling below my expectations like Hereditary, Saint Maud, and False Positive. Unfortunately, Lamb has ranked in the latter category. I’m not surprised Lamb was mismarketed as a horror film but even so, I would have been fine with that. What I did not enjoy was the lack of enjoyment I got from viewing Lamb.

Lamb is an Icelandic film about a husband and wife who realize one of the lambs that are born on their farm is half-human with a lamb head. One issue I had with the film was the lack of mystery and tension that could have been built in its script and direction. The first part of the film was hesitant to show the full “creature,” which I thought was a great stylistic choice.

What is more frightening than having an image of something in your head and never actually seeing it? However, as the film progressed not only is the creature shown in full but it has full scenes where it walks and plays. The effects look like very cheap and ridiculous CGI. The film should have taken a page from The Witch in that the goat creature in that film was never shown directly, which made it so much more frightening.

Lamb was a dull folktale with little emphasis on the “strong” relationship between the lamb and her human parents. With such an outlandish plot and relationship between parent and child, it would make sense for the film to make the audience emotionally connect to their relationship and get behind it enough to not care if their child is indeed an animal. However, we just see fleeting moments of interactions that fall extremely flat emotionally.

Oftentimes, I can answer the question as to why a film was made, either by interpreting its message or analyzing its characters regarding the story. After reading an LA Times interview with Jóhannsson, his main actor Noomi Rapace, who plays Maria, says, “A lot of the directors that I’ve worked with would start with a psychological or emotional perspective,” said Rapace. “[He] starts with a visual.” This was my major issue with Lamb.

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Beginning a storyboard with a visual rather than a perspective is not necessarily bad, but for a film such as Lamb, it greatly hindered it from being as clever as it wanted to be. As a result, it leaves the film with very little to say. Its primary “purpose” and commentary on the laws of nature is too broad and not specific enough to gain interest in its idea. The ending is underwhelming, in the sense that for such a bizarre folktale it has such a simple message that isn’t even fleshed out well enough to bother caring. This is one film I would suggest skipping altogether.

‘A24’s Lamb’ Rating – 2/5

Follow Steph (the Author) on Instagram – @cinemasteph_7

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