Movies
Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
Best / Worst of the Decade
Wide Releases
Now In Theaters
49
2012
41
Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel
84
Avatar![]()
69
Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans
53
Blind Side
53
Book of Eli, The
55
Christmas Carol, A
57
Daybreakers
43
Dear John
27
Did You Hear About the Morgans?
55
Edge of Darkness
45
Extraordinary Measures
83
Fantastic Mr. Fox![]()
42
From Paris with Love
65
Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, The
74
Invictus
57
It's Complicated
34
Law Abiding Citizen
33
Leap Year
33
Legion
42
Lovely Bones, The
54
Men Who Stare At Goats, The
34
Ninja Assassin
19
Old Dogs
xx
Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief
39
Planet 51
79
Precious: Based on the Novel by Sapphire
73
Princess & the Frog, The
64
Road, The
57
Sherlock Holmes
27
Spy Next Door, The
36
Tooth Fairy
44
Twilight Saga: New Moon, The
83
Up in the Air![]()
xx
Valentine's Day
25
When in Rome
71
Where the Wild Things Are
xx
WolfMan, The
63
Youth in Revolt
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
Limited Releases
Now In Theaters
46
44 Inch Chest
83
Ajami![]()
73
Amreeka
xx
Barefoot to Timbuktu
19
Bitch Slap
24
Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day, The
76
Broken Embraces
64
Cloud 9
65
Coco Before Chanel
84
Cove, The![]()
84
Crazy Heart![]()
21
Crazy on the Outside
48
Creation
xx
Daddy Long Legs
81
Damned United, The![]()
68
Departures
62
District 13: Ultimatum
85
Education, An![]()
71
Eyes Wide Open
24
Falling Awake
81
Fish Tank![]()
56
For My Father
xx
From Mexico with Love
43
Frozen
68
Girl on the Train, The
52
Killing Kasztner
74
Last Station, The
43
Little Traitor, The
51
Loss of a Teardrop Diamond, The
73
Me and Orson Welles
76
Messenger, The
57
Missing Person, The
67
Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers, The
xx
My Name is Khan
49
Nine
63
North Face
xx
October Country
67
Off and Running
52
Paranoids, The
49
Pop Star on Ice
49
Private Lives of Pippa Lee, The
xx
Promised Lands (Re-release)
69
Red Riding Trilogy, The
29
Saint John of Las Vegas
69
September Issue, The
36
Serious Moonlight
63
Shinjuku Incident, The
77
Single Man, A
xx
Still Bill
76
Terribly Happy
74
That Evening Sun
19
To Save a Life
68
Town Called Panic, A
59
Until the Light Takes Us
xx
Videocracy
65
Waiting for Armageddon
82
White Ribbon![]()
43
Women in Trouble
xx
Word is Out
64
Young Victoria, The
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
Lorna's Silence
EMAILPRINTSony Pictures Classics

Generally favorable reviews
Based on 24 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 8 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Drama
Written by:
Jean-Pierre Dardenne
Luc Dardenne
Directed by:
Jean-Pierre Dardenne
Luc Dardenne
Release Date:
Theatrical: July 31, 2009
DVD: January 5, 2010
Running Time: 105 minutes, Black and White | Color
Origin: Belgium | France | Italy | Germany
Language(s): French | Albanian
Summary
RATING: R for brief sexuality/nudity, and language
Starring Alban Ukaj, Fabrizio Rongione, and Jeremie Renier
The destiny of a woman caught between love and the law of the underworld. Lorna, a young Albanian woman living in Belgium, has her sights set on opening a snack bar with her boyfriend, Sokol. In order to do so, she becomes an accomplice in a diabolical plan devised by mobster Fabio. Fabio has set up a false marriage between Lorna and Claudy allowing Lorna to get her Belgian citizenship. However, she is then asked to marry a Russian mafioso who's ready to pay hard cash to also get his hands on those vital Belgian identity papers. Fabio intends to kill Claudy in order to speed up the second marriage. But will Lorna remain silent? (Sony Pictures Classics)
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
New York Post V.A. Musetto
The androgynous Dobroshi is in nearly every scene. She has an exceptional screen presence that brings authority to her portrayal of a woman seeking redemption. As for the Dardennes, they prove yet again that nobody does human frailty the way they do.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas
A gritty, deceptively low-key, no-fuss, no-frills movie of consistent originality and surprise in which suspense arises straight up from the heroine's evolving character.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
A stunning study of one desperate woman's conscience.
Read Full Review >The New York Times A.O. Scott
Lorna's Silence is engrossing and powerful, which may be just another way of saying it's a film by the Dardenne brothers. If it falls a bit short of the standards of their best work, that is only because it is not quite a masterpiece.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
Renier’s performance is the best thing in the movie, although all the actors, cast partly for their faces, are part of creating this desperate world.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Ty Burr
The Dardennes resist the expected cliches: The climactic scenes gather force and purpose and the movie seems headed for a breakthrough of some sort, but then it glides softly and unexpectedly to a halt.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
On a deeper level, the Dardennes' film offers a portrait of a fragile yet determined woman set on making a home for herself in the world, even as that world unravels before her eyes.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer
By Dardenne standards this plot is pretty pulpy and unconvincing, but I rather enjoyed watching them attempt to twist it into an existentialist pretzel.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Sam Adams
Lorna's Silence feels like a refinement, even a repetition, of earlier themes. But the brothers are repeating themselves at such a high level that the redundancies are more than welcome.
Read Full Review >Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern
Like earlier Dardenne films, Lorna’s Silence is naturalistic, yet this one, beautifully shot in 35 mm film by Alain Marcoen, achieves a poetry of bereftness.
Read Full Review >Variety Justin Chang
The film doesn't pack the same cumulative wallop as the brothers' earlier work, but its low-key artistry, immaculate construction and fine performance by relative newcomer Arta Dobroshi should rouse the usual fest acclaim and arthouse interest.
Read Full Review >Slate Dana Stevens
Something between a love story and a religious morality tale. The hauntingly ambiguous last scene, in which Lorna finds a place of temporary respite from the economic forces that have determined so much of her life, may be the saddest happy ending I've ever seen.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
Lorna's sudden change of heart is a pointed example of what the Dardenne brothers' movies are all about. Capitalism may seem at times like a raging river, but every day, all over the world, people try to make it flow in the opposite direction.
Read Full Review >Washington Post John Anderson
While the Dardennes may be moralists, they are also makers of thrillers: The story within Lorna' 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 -- Belgian boas, with degrees in Marxist theory.
Read Full Review >St. Louis Post-Dispatch Calvin Wilson
This isn't just another crime story, and it would be misleading to suggest that it has anything to do with stylish gunplay, exhilarating car chases or brutal fistfights.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian Marc Mohan
Among the Dardennes' more accessible films, despite a drawn-out finale that still doesn't quite satisfy.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips
If you’re new to the Dardennes, Lorna’s Silence will serve as a fine introduction.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen
Upbeat it ain't, but when the light fades from the final frame, there remains something unusual in the Dardennes canon – the possibility of an escape from futility's clutches, and a reason for hope that might, just might, be more than an illusion.
Read Full Review >NPR Mark Jenkins
Watching Lorna's attempt to balance self-interest and empathy can be heartbreaking. If Lorna's Silence as a whole doesn't rank among the Dardennes's best, it does follow the money to moments and characters that are unforgettable.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
Ultimately, this is not one of the Dardennes' masterpieces. They've made a few of those, but the effect of Lorna's Silence is more modest. It leaves the audience with neither a sense of uplift nor devastation, but, rather, with something more akin to intellectual appreciation.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Nick Pinkerton
The Dardennes retain a company of returning players: Jérémie Renier, Fabrizio Rongione, and Olivier Gourmet. Such loyalty is rare and touching.
Read Full Review >New Orleans Times-Picayune Mike Scott
It boasts strong acting and a nice dose of suspense.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
Lorna's Silence doesn't work, but it's a beautiful misfire.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 6.1 (out of 10) based on 8 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
