Lorna's Silence

We open on a wad of crisp Belgian francs being counted at a bank. Our pupils dilate in a Pavlovian trance. Money. How much is it really worth? A hunger for cash-flow has been cultivated in all of us. But with our hearts in our wallets, what’s left to show love for thy neighbor? These are the questions examined in Lorna’s Silence, the latest award-winning feature from the Belgian director duo Jean Pierre and Luc Dardenne. 

Lorna (played by a richly subtle Arta Dobroshi) is an Albanian immigrant who has relocated to Belgium in the humble hopes of setting up a snack shop with her boyfriend. Desperate for cash, Lorna becomes a bargaining chip in a plot to gain Belgian citizenship for a Russian Mafioso. 

When innocent blood stains the reward of these capitalist cannibals, however, Lorna is forced to choose between her feigned apathy and innate compassion.  

Adding to the Dardenne brothers’ stack of Palme d’Or’s for past films such as Rosetta and L’Enfant, Lorna’s Silence won best screenplay at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival as well as the Lux Prize from the European Parliament for films illustrating the universality of European values and the diversity of European culture. 

As striking as the script is the film’s use of the aesthetic to highlight Lorna’s struggle through a maze of male oppression. The Dardennes choose their hometown of Liege, Belgium as the backdrop for this industrial nightmare, and shoot in a style that draws heavily from their background in documentary.

Intrusive close-ups and the absence of a score force the audience to focus on the piercing performances of the actors. Dobroshi rises to this challenge and does an exceptional job suppressing and burning with the fire that is Lorna, a woman whose passion and preserving nature ultimately outweigh her silence.  

As the Bible says, “For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also.”