Lamb

More dark fable than out-and-out horror, this Icelandic film is a striking study of the beauty and brutality of nature. When a pregnant ewe belonging to farmers Maria (Noomi Rapace) and Ingvar (Hilmir Snaer Gudnason) gives birth to a lamb/human hybrid, they adopt her and call her Ada after their deceased daughter, much to the consternation of the real mother. As the three settle in to domestic harmony - disrupted only by the arrival of Ingvar's layabout brother (Bjorn Hlynur Haraldsson) - co-writer/director Valdimar Johannsson uses the mist-shrouded landscape and watchful animals to suggest mystical, even malevolent, undercurrents. Brought to life by a combination of child actors, visual effects and puppetry, Ada is incredibly expressive, while Rapace's fierce performance anchors the film in emotional reality. Although glacially paced and not for everyone, Lamb is an impressively strange and disquieting creation.