Elsa is a ten-year-old Sámi girl living in northern Sweden, who ceremonially adopts a reindeer according to local custom. When she witnesses the animal be brutally slaughtered by a local non-Sámi, she is deeply affected. Ten years later, an adult Elsa (Elin Kristina Oskal) is forced to take matters into her own hands when the man (Martin Wallström) continues his criminal activities.

Stolen is a 2024 thriller, and the directing debut of Swedish (and Sámi) filmmaker Elle Márjá Eira. While much of the film is a straight-forward and broadly familiar affair, it gains traction with its audience via some sensationally pretty location footage and a rich sense of cultural detail. It is now streaming exclusively on Netflix.

The Sámi are the traditional peoples of northern Scandinavia and Russia, who have practised – and many continue to practice – traditional vocations such as reindeer herding. Their lands, known as Sápmi, were for a time referred to as Lapland – however that term, as well as called the Sámi Lapps, is now considered racist. Not only is Elle Márjá Eira Sámi, so are the relevant members of her cast including Elin Kristina Oskal. Oskal is tremendous in the lead role, and dominates much of the film. She is well balanced by Martin Wallström, who plays Swedish reindeer-killer Robert Isaksson. He cuts a menacing but very believable figure: Isaksson is deeply racist and cruel, but he is also a friend of the local police. That his constant unpleasantness is tolerated by authorities, despite its huge cumulative damage to the Sámi community, has a depressing ring of truth.

Structurally and tonally the film resembles any number of bleak Scandinavian noir films, only in this case the serial killer is murdering reindeer rather than human beings. Eira is successful in expressing the significance of the reindeer to Sámi culture, and in doing so gives the animal murders a weight and a terrible sadness that other filmmakers might not manage. While this is a film predominantly focused on animal welfare, it will be a tough watch for animal lovers.

Cinematographer Ken Are Bongo takes full advantage of the film’s rural setting to offer wide, eye-catching vistas of the Swedish tundra. It may be bleak territory, but it is beautiful as well. The locations are also ably used to up the tension, with each confrontation or discovery rendered unexpectedly frightening due to their isolation and loneliness: if something bad were to happen to Elsa in the wild, there is clearly not going to be anyone around to help.

The film’s background is richly detailed with what feels an authentic Sámi experience, in which indigenous tradition and practice chafes against modern-day priorities like iron ore mining. Communities are losing members as young Sámi abandon their families for broader Sweden. Racism, both mean-spirited and ignorant, persists. Suicide is a genuine concern among the people.

Sámi cinema is on the rise, which can only be a good thing, and Stolen seems one of the higher profile entries in a genuine wave of films. One can only hope it finds success and encourages the distribution of more Sámi films in the coming years.