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There are certain films that you just feel are quite unmemorable. They aren’t dreadful but they leave no lasting memory and they are almost forget by the time you get home from the theater. And then there are films that leave you so amused by its poor execution that you worry you won’t be able to shake off the lack of enjoyment feeling. They say no press is bad press but let’s be honest do you really want your art to be remembered as something that infuriated the viewer due less to content and instead execution. SUKKWAN ISLAND has an audience out there for sure, it’s the kind of film that if your co-worker ever stumbles upon they won’t shut up about what they just experienced and the rug that was pulled from under them. Let be preface with saying SUKKWAN ISLAND is far from the worst thing ever. Hell it’s not even the worst thing this critic saw at Sundance (I’m too kind heartened to write that review) but SUKKWAN ISLAND directed by Vladimir de Fontenay is an endurance test. A film that begs you to ask how much of its story you can actually buy into your crying uncle. And even by that point you are rewarded with a re-contextual observation of the film you just watched begging the question, what was it all even for?

Roy doesn’t know his father. As a child Roy (Woody Norman) rarely gets to hear from his father Tom (Swann Arlaud) and sees him even less. This trauma bond has followed Roy all the way to his more adult years (where he is played by Ruaridh Mollica). Roy has ventured out to the Norwegian fjords to seek out a remote cabin. Why this place? Well when Roy was a young teenager he agreed to take a trip with his father out to this cabin where they would live and survive off the land for one year. Basically a Man vs Wild episode  if your dad was a much less competent Bear Grylls. While the situation may seem almost endearing  it’s hard to tell if the director himself believes what he is selling. The situational seems peculiar but still believable.  Even when the pilot Anna (Alma Pöysti) brings them to their location it comes with some curiosity if they can handle all this. Tom assures them they can. ISLAND’s believability early on relies on Norman and Arlaud as performers.  Arlaud with his boyish hair may have made hearts feel sad in “Anatomy of a Fall” but here Arlaud knows as Tom he has to earn our trust. It’s an intriguing decision and while we want to trust Tom it’s impossible to shake that feeling of how much danger he is putting Roy in, all for the shake of bonding with someone that most likely had better opportunities at hand. Norman on the other hand as Roy has no trouble winning us over. Norman who broke out in Mike Mill’s “C’mon C’mon” proved that he is a natural talent. His resistance and frustration as Roy always feels counteracted with his curiosity to learn who his father truly is and also get the experience of being a man he may not get at home with his mom and girlfriend. While the two performers find ways to bounce off one another the situation at hand still feels far too manipulated often due to some very clunky dialogue. But even with these shortcomings the film often feels like it has a deeper secret up its sleeve.

That deeper secret being kept by the film may be one of the more egregious acts in a film as of lately. The biggest issue with it is that it practically deems the previous two hours prior pointless. This is not the make or break it moment of the film, as stated the film had issues prior. Its repetitive nature somehow gives us tons of ton with our leads and yet we feel like we rarely ever know them. Both men feel so hellbent on never letting the other one in, and while that may work for the theme of the film of abandonment and betrayal it only just keeps you at a great distance losing interest the more it goes along. The film, felt like two halves, works best when there is that bond between Roy and Tom. A moment involving an after dinner dip in the lake tuned to the The Talking Head’s “This Must Be the Place” is a shining moment. But these moments of bonding show that de Fontenay as a director struggles more with the hard hitting topics that guide the later half of the film. The film’s attempt to reach the same catharsis as the novel only just brings up the issue that hurts many book to screen adaptations, and that is juts the fact that not every book works better or even the same on screen. Many a times a reader and fan of a book will get bothered by changes from the source material but more than often it is done in service of the new medium. SUKKWAN ISLAND doesn’t know if it wants to be faithful adaptation or a chance to emphasis some of the greater moments. Either way it does so in replacement of a well structured film. Instead its ability to entertain or remind us that life is full of mistakes we will one day have to come to terms with feels cheated and only leaves us feeling just as lost in the woods.

C-

SUKKWAN ISLAND premiered at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition. It is currently seeking U.S. distribution