The Light Between Oceans – movie review

Directed by Derek Cianfrance (The Place Beyond the Pines) and starring Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander, The Light Between Oceans is a beautiful looking, heartbreaking story about love and sacrifice. It is based upon the bestselling Australian book by M.L. Stedman, her first novel.

Stedman’s novel became somewhat of a literary sensation upon its publication in 2012. It spent more than a year on The New York Times’ Best Sellers’ list and has been translated into almost 40 languages. Set on the remote edge of Western Australia in the years following the devastation of the Great War, the book lured readers into an old-fashioned tale of tenderness and impossible choices. Beneath it laid churning, contemporary questions of right and wrong, the effects of war and peace, and the dangers of blind scruples.

Tom Sherbourne (Michael Fassbender), a shell-shocked World War I veteran, devotes himself to his new job as lighthouse keeper on the otherwise uninhabited Janus Rock, a secluded island off the coast of Western Australia, surrounded by nothing but the vast sea, seeking solace in the solitude. He intends to remain alone, but unexpectedly meets Isabel Graysmark (Alicia Vikander), a vivacious young woman from the town of Partageuse, across the harbour, herself grieving two brothers lost in the war.  The couple lives a quiet life, blissfully in love and sheltered from the rest of the world. Then one day a mysterious rowboat washes ashore carrying a dead man and a crying baby girl. Reeling from heartache, Tom and Isabel decide to raise the infant as their own, setting off a chain of events – some impetuous, others wrenching – that unravel, with shattering consequences.

Spectacular vistas, super cinematography and a cavalcade of top international and Australian actors can’t paper over a ponderous script. The story is a good one, but did it have to be so laboured? I believe not. I understand that you have to establish the characters and the settings, but languid is the word that immediately comes to mind when describing the pacing. And, to be candid, I didn’t really buy that the relatively gregarious character that Alicia Vikander plays would fall for an insular, taciturn man such as is Michael Fassbender’s role.

That aside, not surprisingly everything kicked up a gear once the pair took in the baby. Of course, we knew that would never end well, but exactly where the story was headed was the whole point of the screenplay. Jack Thompson plays a jaunty and jocular seaman while Bryan Brown is under-utilised as a grandfather. As for Garry McDonald, who is cast as Isabel’s father, he changes his tune far too quickly for my liking, from surly to embracing.

The Light Between Oceans lurches towards melodrama as the story develops. As for the ending, it can be seen as: a) too convenient, b) too far-fetched, and c) something drawn from a Nicholas Sparks novel. Perhaps it is all of the above. So, the movie looks good but is too much about atmospherics for its own good. Rated M and also starring Rachel Weisz, it scores a 6 out of 10.

Director: Derek Cianfrance
Cast: Alicia Vikander, Rachel Weisz, Michael Fassbender
Release Date: 3 November 2016
Rating: M

Alex First