A decade-old act of violence against her family's reindeer pulls a young Sámi woman back into her hometown in Stolen, a 2024 Swedish drama that follows her search for justice amid rising hostility toward her community.
What is Stolen about?
Nine-year-old Elsa watches her family's reindeer killed by a poacher and is frightened into staying silent about what she saw. Ten years later, now an adult, she returns determined to find the truth and hold someone accountable, even as the case reopens old wounds in a Sámi community already strained by prejudice from outside it. The film widens from that one act of violence into a broader look at the pressures facing Sápmi's reindeer-herding families — rising xenophobia, a changing climate that is making herding harder, and the toll that collective desperation takes on the community's young people. Set in northern Sweden, the 105-minute drama moves at a deliberate pace, letting silence and landscape carry as much weight as dialogue.
About the cast
Elin Kristina Oskal plays the adult Elsa, with Martin Wallström, Lars-Ánte Wasara, Magnus Kuhmunen, Pávva Pittja, Ida Persson Labba and Jennifer Lila rounding out an ensemble drawn largely from Sápmi, the traditional Sámi region spanning northern Scandinavia. Director Elle-Márjá Eira, herself Sámi, brings a grounded, region-specific perspective to the material in her feature debut.
Context & significance
Stolen premiered in 2024 as a Swedish production adapted from Ann-Helén Laestadius's novel of the same name, placing Sámi culture and the country's far north at its center rather than treating the setting as backdrop. It has drawn a solid, unshowy reception — steady and respectable for a slow-burn regional drama rather than a mainstream blockbuster. The ten-year gap in the story gives the film room to look at how a community carries an unresolved injustice across time, tying one family's loss to broader questions about land, prejudice, and belonging.
Watching Stolen on Ktime
Stolen is available on K-Time with a free account login, complete with Persian dubbing and Persian subtitles so audiences can follow its quieter, dialogue-light passages without missing a beat, all through a Farsi-language interface built for viewers across the diaspora.