The Vanishing

What a breath of fresh air. I don't mean the literal air on these desolate island but a movie without an intrusive soundtrack or where the producers have made sure every scene is fully explained to a dumb audience.

A stark production from a director moving up from TV for the first time and showing talent in the way that Spielberg did with Duel.

Strong acting from a small bunch of blokes in a claustrophobic environment.

The movie is not about the disappearance of the three lighthous keepers from 1900. That was just a pretext. It is about ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. Greed, guilt, suspicion... We always think that we are able to manage extraordinary circumstances, but do we?

I watched The Vanishing because:

• It's a period piece
• I love lighthouses
• Scotland is gorgeous
• Lighthouses are even better on an island.

I got all of these, of course, in a classic tale that owes to authors such as Stevenson or Leroux. A pretty good story indeed.

Great cast. Including a very credible Scotsman played by that Greek actor, the one from Sparta.

The Vanishing is surprisingly good, it tells a sad twisted story with a great deal of mastery, the plot is straightforward but it's actualized with breathtaking performances by everyone in the film, it has this deep eerie and dark feeling to it that adds this gripping factor as we watch dramatic events unfold in front of us, granted, that it has some structural problems with its narrative but the end product is so captivating you just can't take your eyes off it. The slow burn storytelling adds a great deal of suspense as we ourselves examine and analyze what could happen, what I also loved is that through the film itself is dealing with a moral problem as its characters struggle to cope with their new situations, it is really beautiful to watch. The Vanishing does its story justice as we're offered a chilling narrative that doesn't disappoint at all, an all around great effort.

From the premise I almost thought this was similar to "The Lighthouse" with Pattinson and Dafoe. But this is nothing like that. While this is quite somber (for a movie with Butler in it), it is not nearly as intense or good as that. Still the movie is at least decent, with nice play between the 3 main characters. With some added flavor of others thrown in.

Being on an island can do things to your mind. When an outside "force" comes it adds a new ingredient to the mix. This is not always a good thing. And nothing comes for free either ... even if you don't know or haven't read up on the story, once you open something, you know you'll have to live with the consequences. Whatever those may be