The Light Between Oceans was a flawed movie that is likely to bore many, if not most, of its moviegoers. This was evidenced by the guy sitting behind me who was sawing logs for the entire second half. But I am a sucker for broken relationship movies caused by some strife, and that’s what I got here. The only thing I knew about this movie was that it was about a couple living on a small island while he managed a lighthouse and that they found a baby in a boat they took as their own after she suffered a series of miscarriages. I wish I had gone in knowing nothing about this movie.
All I needed to know was that it was a heavy drama, that it featured one of my favorite actors (Michael Fassbender – Shame, Steve Jobs), one of the following great actresses of our time who arrived on the scene with two massive performances in 2015 (Alicia Vikander – Ex Machina, The Other Danish Girl), and the director of one of my favorite movies of all-time (Derek Cianfrance – Blue Valentine, The Place Beyond the Pines). That enough would have gotten me in the theater. That is enough for me to give this a positive review despite a story that had much promise but had some uneven turns, ultimately leading to characters making decisions that didn’t make much sense. What I loved most about this movie (which will be the focus of this review) is how two different people can face the same ethical dilemma and how the decision can eat one person up so much that they almost can’t live with themselves. In contrast, the other person can continue living their life peacefully as if the decision they had to make was whether to have sausage or pepperoni on their pizza the night before.
The year is 1918, and Tom Sherbourne (Fassbender) has earned a temporary position as a lighthouse keeper on the island of Janus Rock, a fictitious remote island off the eastern coast of Australia. The island is composed of both grassy knolls and rocks. In addition to the lighthouse are a small house and a little barn where they can raise animals. Tom, a veteran of World War I, is seeking a new start. Janus Rock is visited just a handful of times yearly by shopkeeper Harry (Benedict Hardie – The Water Diviner). He brings grocery orders, supplies, and mail while ensuring the lighthouse owner remains sane. The previous owner had an accident, thought to be due to the isolation he exhibited on the island. Harry is tentative about hiring Tom because no one in this position has ever been married. Tom assures him that he’ll be fine, saying he’s looking forward to the solitude the job offers.
Isabel (Vikander) is on the mainland, and it doesn’t take about five seconds for them to realize that something will happen between them. Still a traditional life, Isabel cannot come to the island unless married to the lighthouse’s keeper. So, of course, they get married, but not right away. We see them writing letters to each other, and when Tom gets called back to the mainland and is offered the job full-time, he takes Isabel up on her offer to wed him. What ensues is beautiful as they create a life with one another. They have dreams of a big family (let’s be honest, there isn’t much else to do on an abandoned island in 1918), but tragedy ensues as Isabel suffers multiple miscarriages. But then, one day, a baby arrives on a skiff with a man who has been killed. The couple decides to keep the baby and bury the man in an unmarked grave. Everyone on the mainland is aware that Isabel is pregnant, but no one knows she suffered a second miscarriage. Had they kept the baby as their own, no one would ever know.
Vikander won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar last year for her performance in The Other Danish Girl. Ex Machina put her on the map, but people will never forget you for the movies in which you won your awards. Her performance in The Light Between Oceans is the best leading actress I’ve seen so far this year. She held her own with the more veteran Fassbender and gave a better performance. However, I’ve seen lists of who could be the candidates representing this category come awards season, and she’s not even close to the top 15. That could mean that this still has the potential to be an excellent year for lead actresses or that I am overvaluing her performance. But she did a very exceptional job of being extremely likable during parts of this film and highly unlikeable in others. She does such a great job of allowing us to feel her pains, both physically and emotionally, that we can understand her reasons for wanting to keep the baby and raise it as her own. She’s desperately hopeless, and she cannot escape the constant reminders of her losses. The island does nothing to reassure her that she should feel differently.
As mentioned in the first paragraph, The Light Between Oceans was a terrific character study of how two different people might react when faced with the same ethical dilemma. Tom and Isabel are clearly in love and have the same desire to make a family, earn enough money on the island, and return one day to the mainland to raise their many children. When that plan doesn’t work out, the couple does what they can to move on. They are struggling, though. When Lucy washes up on shore, Cianfrance does a fabulous job of getting to the root of the issue and distinguishing between his two leads. Once the baby is safe, Tom instantly wants to signal the mainland. There is no hesitation in his decision. Equally rooted in what she wants is Isabel, who clarifies that she has no interest in letting the child go. She convinces herself that this baby is a gift for them and that they can raise her better than anyone else now that her father is dead.
Never does he think keeping the baby is wrong. Tom never feels that keeping the baby is right. While she can live carefree for the next five years of her life, Tom is constantly tormented by his decision, even though he knows they would never have gotten caught. The guilt weighs heavily on his shoulders to the point where he can no longer go on living a lie, even though it means losing Lucy and possibly angering his wife forever. Seeing this situation bring them together and tear them apart is interesting.
I didn’t find it completely believable, and I’m not sure why it was even part of the story, whether Lucy’s father’s death was in question. You have to consider that when a baby arrives on an abandoned boat, it is perfectly healthy, but the man she was with was dead. Still, despite Isabel’s anger, and as much as I tried, I couldn’t find a reason to believe why she would ever have said Tom was responsible for the man’s murder. It made no sense to me. This wasn’t a twist. Instead, it was out of character and felt awkward. If she wanted to punish him for the rest of his life, she could have done so by agreeing to his plan.
At times, the menacing piano sounds often made the movie appear more like a thriller or even a horror flick. Though this drama was heavy, the music felt too heavy to fit. This, coupled with the fact that the background music was, at times, so loud that it overshadowed the voices, you’ve got some improvements in the area of sound. However, the issues with the sound were compensated for with sweeping images of a film that, I believe, was shot entirely on location. Fassbender and Vikander talked about how the isolation of the shoot felt menacing to both of them at times.
All in all, I was a fan of this movie. As mentioned, this type of movie attracts me the most these days. Cianfrance’s Blue Valentine is an absolute masterpiece (one of my top 25 of all time), while The Place Beyond the Pines had such potential but ultimately failed to live up to its lofty expectations. Like his other two movies, The Light Between Oceans was character-driven, but this one was simpler and softer in tone. It’s not for everyone, but if broken relationship movies are your thing, you can’t do wrong here. It builds up the relationship before tearing it down and leaves you wondering how it’ll end, though, honestly, because of Isabel’s actions that I couldn’t buy into, you don’t care as much about the outcome as you should. Nonetheless, despite its clunkiness at times, it’s still a movie I’d recommend and one that I’ll probably watch one day again.
Plot 8.5/10
Character Development 8.5/10
Character Chemistry 8.5/10
Acting 9/10
Screenplay 7.5/10
Directing 7.5/10
Cinematography 10/10
Sound 7/10
Hook and Reel 7.5/10
Universal Relevance 9/10 (ethical dilemmas change us, for better or for worse)
84%
B
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