Béliers

I had the chance to watch Hrútar / Rams in a cinema in Reykjavik after traveling for 11 days in Iceland. Watching this movie was the highlight of our 2 day long stay in Reykjavik.

During the story we get to know a world that coexists with our modern Western world and of which we know nothing: elderly brothers taking care of and working with sheep.

While one shouldn't expect a Rambo-style Hollywood action movie, the pace is good, there are dramatic and comic scenes following each other in an easily-watchable way with nice shots and great acting (one doesn't think that he watches actors but real life).

I would have loved to have more insights on the life of shepherds and know more of the antecedents but the story told in the movie is a dramatic, full story while the movie is a very well done independent-type European movie.

Just a week ago I saw 'Fúsi' which was about an overweight person with the mind of a child. And now another excellent Icelandic movie that centres on the livestock farmers. One of the best movie about the farmers I have seen. It is not all about their farms, but the love and dedication towards their work. About the art of raising animals that passed through the generations who never abandoned their ancestral village to look for a better life somewhere else. But what happens when suddenly a great threat pose to their way of life that they all only known. That's what this film talk about.

This story is about two brothers Gummi and Kiddi, who have not spoken for decades. They live next door to one another in a remote village raising sheep. When one theirs ram wins a prestigious regional contest, that lead to discover a fear of scrapie epidemic, a disease that might wipe out their local breeds. After this incident, the conflict between the brothers escalates further. So what happens after the entire village lose their business to a viral infection brings a dramatic ending to the story.

This is the advantage of watching world cinemas. You will get a chance to learn a different culture and other unfamiliar stuffs. Nowadays Hollywood is about big budget and superhero movies. Small scale films like this are very occasion, but I'm missing nothing through my love to films around the globe.

I love realism films, but still this film gives a cinematic experience with the beautiful interior landscapes of Iceland. Most of the film takes place in the winter, but all the important outdoor sequences came prior to that season. Still the second half is the best part of the storytelling. After all Iceland without ice/snow is unimaginable.

"If we've scrapie in the valley, we're screwed."

The story has a small twist in the halfway mark, that you could see it coming. But the third act was so awesome, because the pace picks up and brings the unexpected ending. Yet, I was little disappointed the way it concluded. I like the details, I don't always like understandable phrase in a film's ending. Those things are effective for the movies that going have a sequel. So what I meant is the end should have been a bit more specific about what actually happens. If it is about the brothers, not the livestock, then the theme is slightly misleading with all the developments.

I was tempted to rate it close to maximum, like as I said the finale took away the fractions of my 'like' towards this wonderful drama. The lead actor from the 'Virgin Mountain' can be seen in a tiny role in a couple of scenes.

I've heard the ram that acted in this called Garpur was credited, but it was not like any special performance. The movie was very slow, but I like this kind of narration when a story demands its own time to bring anything it wanted to tell on its own perfect way. There are scenes with some dark humours, so it is a semi tragicomedy.

The initial parts, maybe the first act looks like an ordinary rural narration, but if you learn about the story and its character prior to your watch then you might feel comfortable with the pace. This film was sent to the recently concluded Oscars to represent Iceland, but failed to make into the ultimate round. Forget the American Academy Awards, this is still an excellent movie. I won't hesitate to suggest it to you all, it is a dull start, but you would feel worth watching it in the end.

8/10

I had no idea what this film would actually be about. I imagined that it would be some sort of comedy (how wrong I was). I was not prepared for what I got. The narrative revolves around sheep and the consequences of an infection that is going around that could kill them. The film goes beyond that to really share the emotional bond of two brothers, one that they thought was broken for the longest but that may actually still reside underneath. The performances are exquisite, and everyone involved with this needs to be commended for sticking with a film with such an odd plot line and allowing it to fully blossom. Not sure if I would recommend this to just anyone, but sticking with it will be something that some viewers will absolutely be grateful for.

'Rams' is a delightful film, for several reasons.

First, it shows the traditional way of living at the remote Icelandic countryside, a harsh environment where only sheep and stubborn bearded men seem to be able to survive. The beautiful landscape and the traditional farming community are a wonderful setting for this film.

Secondly, it tells a story with so much nice little details, that it's hard not to like it. It's about two brothers who live a few hundred meters from each other but haven't spoken to each other for 40 years. They communicate, if necessary, by writing letters which are carried from one house to the other by a sheepdog. When their flocks of expertly bred sheep are diagnosed with a deadly disease, their lives are turned upside down.

Thirdly, it is a bittersweet drama with a very positive feeling to it. There are many funny moments, filled with the typical deadpan Scandinavian humour. When one of the brothers finds the other lying motionless in the snow, drunk and possibly freezing to death, he picks him up with a large mechanical shovel, deposits him in front of a nearby hospital, and leaves without even getting out of his machine. But as much as they detest each other, the circumstances make an emotional cease-fire inevitable.

This is one of those little gems that deserve to make it to the final selections of the foreign language Oscars. 'Rams' was submitted by Iceland, but not selected for the final shortlist. What a pity.

You don't have to have been to Iceland to appreciate Rams, but it certainly helps explicate the film's grizzled, deadpan sense of humour, or the mysterious, beguiling power resonating from their vast, otherworldly landscapes. Writer/director Grímur Hákonarson crafts a skeletally simple tale of a community of farmers caring for their sheep whose livelihood is threatened by an outbreak of Scrapie, and employs it as a parable for changing with the times, or the creative, belligerent lengths some will go to to avoid doing so.

Framed against the unyielding, jaw-dropping vistas of the Icelandic countryside, the (unexplained) conflict between the central two farmers, the spectacularly named Gummi (Sigurður Sigurjónsson) and Kiddi (Theodór Júlíusson), feels equally mythic and etched in fiery stone, with all communication done by note, or the occasional drunken gunshot. It's sometimes difficult to tell what's meant to be funny or sombre in their antics in coping with their isolation and the pending slaughter of their sheep, but Hákonarson embraces the intersection, allowing their impassive, tentative emotional ambiguity and unapologetic wackiness to tease out the tension between amusingly petulant actions and the hard life that's spawned them.

In fact, the film's main criticism is an increasing suspicion that the awe-inspiring impassivity of its stony plains and narrative alike overly inflates the sense of profundity therein. There's a primal elegance to the simplicity of Rams, but its scenario and central conflict are somewhat too familiar to not supplant with further scripting or characterization. Hákonarson's glacial pace, at first hypnotic and appropriate for the unyielding consistency of the farmers, becomes restless over time, making the film begin to feel sleepier when it should evidence an elegiac crescendo. Things perk up with a stormy and unexpectedly tender climax, but there's a larger breadth of untapped subtext which leaves the film feeling thoroughly pleasant, but flimsier than it should amidst such steadfast a landscape.

If nothing else, the film should be commended for the abilities of its cast to convey so much largely through solemn staring into the distance. Sigurður Sigurjónsson brings a craggy affability to protagonist Gummi, the crinkles of affection crawling across his normally desolate features as he caresses the wool of his prized sheep making it all the more moving as he comes to terms with the heartbreaking of their pending slaughter. As the crabbier estranged brother, Theodór Júlíusson tempers comedic blustering and haphazard nudity with an undercurrent of real hurt and loss. Both are so odd it's easy to understand how they'd connect so much easier with their sheep, but also the ferocious indignation with which they'll protect not only their individual animals, but their livelihood, lifestyle, and family legacy.

Rams, in its deliberate primal simplicity, may not offer all the answers to the questions it evokes, but in the hands of such raw,capable performers and the stunning, plaintive Icelandic vistas that Hákonarson films with such reverence, it's a deceptively engaging curiosity, and one worth weathering alongside its farmers. Just keep your clothes on, if at a public screening.

-7/10