In a secluded valley in Iceland, Gummi and Kiddi live side by side, tending to their sheep. Their ancestral sheep-stock is considered one of the country’s best and the two brothers are repeatedly awarded for their prized rams who carry an ancient lineage. Although they share the land and a way of life, Gummi and Kiddi have not spoken to each other in four decades. When a lethal disease suddenly infects Kiddi’s sheep, the entire valley comes under threat. The authorities decide to cull all the animals in the area to contain the outbreak. But Gummi and Kiddi don’t give up so easily – and each brother tries to stave off the disaster in his own fashion: Kiddi by using his rifle and Gummi by using his wits.
"This winter get sheepish."
Serious and moving but also with a bleaker than bleak Scandinavian sense of humor, "Rams" is so much its own film that figuring out where its unusual, unpredictable plot will end up is difficult if not impossible....
Coldness and bleak does not just describe the weather conditions in rural Iceland where writer-director Grimur Hakonarson’s slice-of-life farming drama Rams (a.k.a. “Hrutar”) takes place. It can also apply to the distant brotherly relationship of the film’s two main protagonists and their lingering four decade-old estrangement. Surprisingly, it would take the critical conditioning of the obstinate siblings’ ailing livestock to bring them together in realizing the foundation of loss and emotional indifference. Thus, Rams secures its impacting quirkiness as an Icelandic fable about the...
> It is more than just raising the livestock to them.
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 the...