
Island is Paul Cox's serene and beautiful film which explores a spectrum of emotions - ranging from extreme passion to fear, leading to murder - from loneliness to sensuality. Three women from Australia, Sri Lanka, and Greece meet on a Greek island. All are exiles escaping from their own personal tragedies. Ultimately, it is the island itself, with the generosity and warmth of the islanders, which leads all three women to revelations about themselves and their place in the world.
The film centers around two young women, Becca and Sam, who were once high school sweethearts until they reconnect in their town.
"WHAT ARE YOU WILLING TO SACRIFICE?!!!!" "EVERYTHING!!!!!" This is but one of a multitude of highly emphatic questions, and subsequent answers, being asked in the newest feature film from one of the current masters of horror, Jordan Peele ("Get Out", "Us" and "Nope"). I must give Peele credit in that he continues to push the boundaries of specific genres and their associated tropes in order to provide what ends up amounting to subtly then jarringly intense, yet still character and story-driven, cinema that speaks more to indie stylings than mainstream.
These confines won’t really encourage you to read the film as a metaphor for the nerve-inducing experience we’ve all been through over the last year, however — and in the interest of maintaining your dignity, you probably shouldn’t. While the sociopolitical commentary may have worked for the similarly-themed Buried (2010), in which we find Ryan Reynolds on his own buried alive in the Middle East, but this futuristic take on the premise is best left as a piece of distracting entertainment. Nevertheless, the atmosphere is no less suffocating, literally and dramatically.
The way Jeannette has to deal with child neglect makes her insecure about her parents and how she was brought up and raised in the United States. This continues into adulthood, where Jeannette becomes a successful journalist and is frequently asked about her parents by others.
The biggest highlight of the film is easily the performance of Andrew Garfield. In his days since hanging up his Spiderman suit, Garfield has routinely churned out great performances, and Mainstream is no exception. He proves that he is willing to try anything and go anywhere in a character.