Lorna's Silence (2008)
Average Rating: 7.2/10
Reviews Counted: 93
Fresh: 80 | Rotten: 13
Subtle and emotionally bleak, this gripping thriller features the Dardenne brothers' recognizable penchant for realism and very strong performances.
Average Rating: 7.8/10
Critic Reviews: 28
Fresh: 26 | Rotten: 2
Subtle and emotionally bleak, this gripping thriller features the Dardenne brothers' recognizable penchant for realism and very strong performances.
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Average Rating: 3.5/5
User Ratings: 4,511
Movie Info
An Albanian woman living in Belgium finds her dreams of opening a snack bar with her boyfriend leading to tragedy after she agrees to marry a Russian Mafioso in order to gain citizenship. All Lorna wanted was to start a small business with her loving boyfriend, but in order to make that happen she would first have to gain citizenship. Local mobster Fabio claims that he can make that happen if Lorna agrees to a sham marriage with a man named Claudy. After gaining Belgian citizenship, Lorna
May 19, 2008 Wide
May 20, 2008
Sony Pictures Classics
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Cast
-
Arta Dobroshi
Lorna -
Jérémie Renier
Claudy Moreau -
Fabrizio Rongione
Fabio -
Alban Ukaj
Sokol -
Morgan Marinne
Spirou -
Olivier Gourmet
inspector -
Anton Yakovlev
Andrei -
Grigori Manoukov
Kostia -
Mireille Bailly
Monique Sobel -
Stephanie Gob
mental health nurse -
Laurent Caron
detective -
Baptiste Sornin
morgue employee
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Lorna's Silence Trailer & Photos
All Critics (95) | Top Critics (29) | Fresh (80) | Rotten (13) | DVD (1)
Lorna's Silence doesn't work, but it's a beautiful misfire.
Top CriticAs filmmakers, the Dardennes are more concerned with probing the causes of crime than in glamorizing it.
In casting the previously unknown Dobroshi, the brothers approach greatness with their lean portrait of simple humanity tested by desire and driven desperate by circumstances.
The story within Lorna's Silence is built on tiny increments of tantalizing details, meted out in penurious droplets and with chest-tightening tension that suggests that what the brothers wanted to be when they grew up were boa constrictors.
The Dardennes are masters of their brand of realist cinema. Over the years, the brothers' move from documentaries to narrative features has been handsomely rewarded.
Dobroshi, a dark-browed beauty, has an arresting stillness - never smiling (except for one brief, unguarded moment with Sokol), never letting down her guard. It's a slice of a life nobody would want, and a portrait that's not easy to forget.
Heaven on earth for the Dardenne Bros., the poets of European mercantile desolation.
Redemption drama loses the plot.
It's a classic Dardennes morality tale set in the grim, hard-scrabble world between working class hardship and black market hustle...
a moving portrait of emotional and social awakening
This masterfully crafted tale of muted female survival in a quietly brutal world, the film unfolds petal by petal, as it stirringly reveals mere inklings of the character's haunting inner emotional and psychological turmoil.
Once again brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne explore the moral predicaments that arise from economic desperation.
It's Lorna's evolution (charted through Dobroshi's uncompromising performance) that makes "Lorna's Silence" worth seeing. But the Dardennes shouldn't have been so deliberately stingy with the details of her story.
...less a character study than the apparent breaking-in of a camera crew on a sad and sordid life.
By scorning accessibility, the filmmakers unwittingly throw out the baby with the bathwater. After all, what's authentically human, if not high drama?
Mirthless and deliberately paced, there's still enough in the well-acted Lorna's Silence to make it worth listening to.
The Dardennes have once again captured the harsh reality of the modern underclass while also injecting a note of moral hopefulness into what might have been a bleak and heartless tale.
Money -- not love or family -- is the (literal) currency that motivates social behavior; human relationships are reduced to financial transactions.
Lorna's Silence speaks volumes.
A unique filmmaking style that resembles near-documentary realism. If you were not aware that this was a movie, you would think you were watching surveillance footage recorded by a sophisticated private investigation firm.
Offers powerful emotional impact at unexpected moments.
Lorna's Silence echoes long after the movie ends.
With a more linear plot and steadier camerawork than previous efforts, Lorna's Silence is among the Dardennes' more accessible films, despite a drawn-out finale that still doesn't quite satisfy.
In a just world, the Dardenne brothers would be as well known as the Coens; outside the United States they probably are already.
More entertaining on a base level than a Belgian film about poor people has any right to be.
Audience Reviews for Lorna's Silence
Super Reviewer
The protagonists are Albanians who have built an elaborate scam to benefit Russians and other Easterners trying to get citizenship in the European Union. Deeply disturbing is the cold, matter-of-fact way they put value on the lives of others. Lorna, the main character, is the only woman in the group. I don't want to reveal all the details, so let's just say that Lorna sees this lack of empathy for others most vividly. Her central dilemma is whether to continue in this life or make some changes. Her struggle is profound, and the lives of several others hang in the balance.
My problem is that the Albanians' complete amorality starts to seem phony. European filmmakers frequently try to fit life into their theories, rather than trying to build theories that match life. Here I felt the Dardennes were driven to convey a message about contemporary society, and they developed arch caricatures of people to drive that message home. But I wouldn't push this criticism too far. "Lorna's Silence" is still an important and very good film and should be seen by anyone who appreciates serious cinema. Just don't watch it when you're feeling fragile. The film does have the power to be deeply disturbing despite the fact that there's not one iota of on-screen violence. Its power to disturb is far more subtle.
Super Reviewer
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Movie: ID: 770769997 Title: Lorna's Silence Release Date: 2008-05-19 00:00:00.0 MPAA: 4 Status: 1
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Foreign Titles
- Lornas Schweigen (DE)
- The Silence of Lorna (Le Silence de Lorna) (UK)
