Islands ★★★★

Released: 12 September 2025

Director: Jan-Ole Gester

Starring: Sam Riley, Stacy Martin, Jack Farthing, Dylan Torrell

Sun, sand, sea and summer all year ‘round are words that often left the lips of many, young British school leavers and retired holiday makers swooning about a life in Costa del Sol, or one of those ready-made Jet2 Holidays packages that promise paradise and continuous fun. Such ambitions might have also been shared by Tom, a UK tennis coach who permanently lives on an island in the Canary Islands who outwardly appears to be living the dream with his play tennis for a few hours a day and enviable party all night lifestyle! But, is island life as perfect as it seems? Tom, played brilliantly by Sam Riley finds that his carefully constructed lifestyle is disrupted when a new family arrive for the summer and enlist his tennis services but threaten to disrupt his avoidance habits on a remote island. Islands showcases the sensual aura of a simmering island combined with a delicious Hitchcockian intrigue that is bound to intoxicate many travellers and wanderlust seekers and those that also enjoy a good old fashioned, slow, suspenseful build up that is missing from many storylines gracing our screens these days.

We are first introduced to Tom against the magnificent splendour of the Islands terroir with its moody, volcanic presence felt. It is a wordless scene but in hindsight provides a key within this acute character study. Tom’s car refuses to start, which ramps up a sense of tension with an unnamed pressure looming, both in the sense of Tom’s situation but also the main character islands’ dormant, but volcanic nature. There is a feeling of that pressure simmering under the surface, threatening to erupt, and a desire to escape as Tom is trapped momentarily and yet these tiny insights open the gateway to unexplored frustrations and desires.

On the face of it, Tom is living the dream with an idyllic lifestyle on a paradise island. Yet, he’s constantly late for the tennis lessons he provides, is often waking up on the beach from a night out and parties heavily in a bid to recapture his youth. Tom’s lack of responsibilities may seem enviable but Islands slowly comes to the boil to demonstrate the cracks that begin to appear within the veneer. Effectively, Islands unearths a portrait of loneliness and escapism within Tom but also in other characters he encounters.

Director Jan-Ole Gester appears to have taken inspiration from psychological, slow paced French films, similar to Claude Chabrol films, which may be implicitly sensual but embedded with layers of intrigue. Every glance, hidden smile, accidental touch conveys that sense of the unknown and mystery when Anne and her family arrive and befriend Tom. Their family unit is the antithesis to Tom’s lifestyle which implicitly seems to provide him with a new lease of life away from his ennui.

Islands is a slow burn but Gester proves to be a master at teasing out possible conundrums that follow Anne’s husband’s disappearance. The film’s aspect ratio and setting on these islands that could potentially erupt at any moment, offer parallels to the turmoil within Tom’s new life as he becomes more embroiled within Anne’s situation. Anne played by Stacy Martin is positioned as that pretty, potentially manipulative actress accustomed to having her own way, but secretly frustrated with her domestic settings. Clever angles and the pacing of scenes enable the audience’s imagination to depict her portrayal as the femme fatale of a film noir. But, is she or have we, as the audience been purposefully manipulated by circumstantial onscreen events? The chemistry between Riley and Martin sizzles onscreen adding that delicious twist to a dangerous game that materialises over which Tom does not have control of the serve.

Islands is a fascinating exercise in its subtle exploration of human wants, desires and ambitions. Sometimes, life may provide alternate pathways to the life that we imagined possessing whilst younger and may also result in becoming different versions of ourselves. The film questions the need to be authentic with ourselves and discover whether we may also be self sabotaging in an attempt to indulge in self-preservation as whilst Tom’s hedonistic lifestyle appeared, on the surface, to be fun and carefree there was also a sense of loneliness, desperation and an inability for the character to evolve.

Captivating with beautiful cinematography capturing the islands which become a moody background character, Islands is a stylish, thrilling watch that will evoke that wanderlust to explore the Canary Islands, immerse oneself within its atmospheric landscape but to be careful not to overstay our welcome.