Last week, I watched a movie I had been looking forward to seeing for the last three years. But guess what? It was definitely not worth the wait.
The title, The Island Between Tides has a kind of cool ring to it, and it seems like an appropriate subject for Prince Rupert, but I should have been warned by the film’s genre — “Family Gothic”.
For much of the story the film is immersed in darkness. The little island is dark, the house is dark, and the viewers are kept in the dark.
It’s almost as if they were trying to save money on electricity during the filming — the indoor lighting was so dark you could barely see the characters.
OK, there is a little bit of sunshine when the protagonist escapes the island and gets a boat ride back to civilization, but not for long, and then it all goes dark again.
And to me, what is unforgivable about this movie is how darkly it portrays our town.
The cinematographer seemed to have gone out of their way to film Prince Rupert on the darkest, gloomiest winter days, but what is worse is the way the residents are portrayed as largely uncaring and anonymous.
This is brought out in a fight scene on the Cow Bay dock, where a man is savagely beaten and murdered before a group of indifferent onlookers — one of them casually scrolling on her cell phone.
In my 32 years living in Prince Rupert, I have never seen anything remotely like this occurring and can’t imagine it occurring without instant intervention to stop it.
Even the town’s library is shown as dark and inadequately lit, although, to the film’s credit, the librarian comes across as warm and helpful.
Besides the obligatory secret basement full of old and scary things, the one interesting suggestion is the ferry that, instead of taking the protagonists to the airport, takes them to the cannery museum in the middle of the night.
Now there’s an idea — a ferry cruise to the North Pacific Cannery, preferably during the day, would certainly add to the tourist experience, especially if we kept its accessibility by road from the passengers, as the film does.
When I first heard about the film, I was thinking of various places they should have gone to: Skiakle Island, Dolly Island, or China Island, all are tidal islands and very atmospheric.
But here’s the major problem with the film: the magic island is sorely missing in magic, and the connection to the dark house with the hidden basement is only made apparent at the end with a pair of paintings.
The acting was OK, especially the main character, but I think they could have done a better job recruiting local actors for some of the supporting characters to really give it more of a local feel.
Apparently most of the local acting was cut out in the final edit.
I find it rather humourous that Wayne Place was featured prominently. Who would have guessed that?
Where the film ultimately failed, though, was in the writing. We have local writers who could have done a much better job.
