An average movie

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but since it was directed by Ron Howard and since there was a decent cast involved, I thought I might as well check it out. Well, I have always been interested in people pursuing an alternative lifestyle and, when they displayed some actual vintage footage of the people who lived on this island during the end-credits, I was thinking it was actually a fascinating story. Unfortunately, the movie itself didn’t turn out to be great though. I always had mixed feelings about Ron Howard’s work but, in this case, I’m not sure if he should be the one to be blamed though. Basically, the main thing that bothered me was the approach they took with these characters as too many of them were some frustrated and frustrating manipulative narcissists. First, you had Friedrich Ritter and his girlfriend Dore Strauch and I was just rather annoyed by how they vehemently rejected the Wittmers. Basically, they had decided to live on a deserted island with such harsh conditions and, in this case, why should they reject this couple since they seemed to have some solid survival skills? Survival might become slightly easier by cooperating with some capable neighbors instead of constantly antagonizing them. However, even more problematic was the Baroness though. I’m not blaming Ana de Armas as she gave once again another solid performance here but, in my opinion, her character just didn’t make sense. Basically, she was some kind of actress/con-artist but why on Earth a sophisticated woman obviously used to a luxury life would choose to go live on a deserted island? I mean, her plan to build a hotel was completely idiotic and it didn’t make sense that such a seemingly smart woman would go for something completely doomed to fail and I wish they made an effort to better explain her motivations. Concerning the Wittmers, they were not so bad but they were also probably too bland, I’m afraid. Anyway, to conclude, in spite of its flaws, it was still a decent watch though, even if it could have been so much better though which is very often the case with Ron Howard’s work, I’m afraid. 

6/10