Artfully misdirecting viewer expectations for most of its slow-burn runtime, Islands camouflages a bittersweet psychological drama about lost souls and lonely exiles in the stylish garments of a noir-adjacent crime thriller, with overlong but generally satisfying results.
German writer-director Jan-Ole Gerster scored a modest sleeper hit with his prize-wining debut feature Oh Boy (2012), aka A Coffee in Berlin, and picked up critical plaudits for his second, Lara (2019). Working for the first time with a largely British cast, and mostly English-language dialogue, his third has more mainstream crossover potential than either of its predecessors, even if the twisty screenplay ultimately fails to deliver the full-blooded genre pay-off it initially seems to promise. Following its gala world premiere at the Berlinale this week, Islands is set for a domestic cinema release in May.
Sam Riley (Control, Maleficent) plays Tom, a long-time British resident on Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands, where he coaches tennis to the guests at a second-rank resort hotel. In his forties, with no partner or children, Tom still lives like a rootless young bachelor: drinking too much, partying too hard, and occasionally having causal sex hook-ups with tourists. From the outside, he seems to be enjoying a fantasy life of endless sunshine and unlimited hedonism, with zero commitments and zero problems. No regrets, he ritually tells himself, although he is clearly coasting on past glories, with an air of quiet desperation behind his brittle bravado.
Tom is initially resistant when a younger English couple, Anne (Stacy Martin) and Dave (Jack Farthing), enlist him to give their seven-year-old son Anton (Dylan Torrell) tennis lessons. Reformed ravers who now find their lives stifled by parenthood and a dysfunctional marriage, the pair latch onto Tom for different reasons. After a brazenly flirtatious Anne persuades him to act as an unofficial tour guide to the island, Dave drags Tom out on a vodka-soaked nightclub crawl that ends very badly.
The next morning, Dave has vanished without trace, having possibly tumbled into the sea in a drunken haze. As anxiety turns to panic, Anne calls in the police, but she soon becomes oddly flippant about the strong likelihood her husband may be dead. Even as officers trawl the coastline looking for a body, she sips Martinis, basks in the blazing sun, and anoints Tom as unofficial stepdad to Anton.
Gesrster keeps us guessing about his central mystery, playing with the grammar of film noir, dropping ominous hints, chasing red herrings. Are we witnessing a suicide story? A murder mystery? A tragic accident? An innocent man targeted by malign psychopaths in the classic tradition of Hitchcock or Highsmith? Do Tom and Anne have a secret shared past that his booze-pickled memory has erased? The erotic tension between them certainly suggests ulterior motives at play, while the mounting body of evidence around Dave’s disappearance is soon ringing alarm bells.
But just as Islands seems to shift into horror-on-holiday mode, Gerster takes a detour into more nuanced psychological terrain, ruminating on alienation, midlife angst and missed opportunities. In his press notes, the director cites Edward Hopper and Anton Chekhov as influences on the film’s lonesome, yearning mood. While some may feel short-changed by this low-voltage finale, other will appreciate subtle emotional shading instead of tragic melodrama.
Spanning more than two hours, Islands rambles a little too much in its mid-section, and leaves a few plot threads unresolved. But Fuerteventura’s rugged coastline, desert sandscapes and radiant sunsets are all gifts to Gerster and his team, lending the film a naturally widescreen visual grandeur. With his rangy, dishevelled, rock-star-handsome looks, Riley is also a key feature of the film’s elemental canvas. Playing a man of few words, his performance is impressively introverted, conveying hidden wounds with haunted looks and defensive body language. Dascha Dauenhauer’s flowing orchestral score adds another classy, timeless touch.
Director: Jan-Ole Gerster
Screenwriters: Jan-Ole Gerster, Blaz Kutin, Lawrie Doran
Cast: Sam Riley, Stacy Martin, Jack Farthing, Dylan Torrell, Pep Ambròs, Bruna Cusí, Ramiro Blas, Ahmed Boulane, Fatima Adoum
Cinematography: Juan Sarmiento
Editing: Matthew Newman, Antje Zynga
Music: Dascha Dauenhauer
Producers: Jonas Katzenstein, Maximilian Leo
Pruduction company: Augenschein Filmproduktion
World sales: Protagonist
Venue: Berlin Film Festival (Berlinale Special Gala)
In English, Spanish
123 minutes
