Islands in the Stream

A film set on an island in the Bahamas. Thomas Hudson is a sculptor. He lives alone, works, and goes out fishing. He has three sons. All of them are with their mothers and he has not seen them for years. One summer his sons come. From there the film is a story of getting acquainted. He does not know his children and they do not know him. Tom is the eldest. He keeps his distance. Andrew is the middle one. Quiet. David is the youngest. He tries to get close to his father. There is a fishing section. David hooks a broadbill and fights it for hours. He loses it. His father congratulates him and the idea of the scene is there. The summer ends. The boys leave. Then news comes. Tom has been killed in the war. What the narrative is interested in is not family but lateness: its idea is that the man shut himself on an island and only noticed his relationships once he had lost them. The second part tells something else. The island lies on the route of Cuban refugees. A group of Jewish fugitives arrives. Hudson agrees to carry them. The crossing is dangerous. There are patrols, there is a border, and his boat is unarmed. The narrative becomes an action story in its second half and the shift is abrupt. There is a woman as well. His former wife comes, and it is she who brings the news. The source is the novel Ernest Hemingway left, published after his death. The book was unfinished. The film tries to show it as a whole and the break in the structure comes from there. George C. Scott plays the part measured and barely raises his voice. It was filmed in Hawaii. Franklin J. Schaffner directed. George C. Scott, David Hemmings, Gilbert Roland and Susan Tyrrell are in the cast. Who it is for: anyone who likes 1970s American drama and Hemingway adaptations. Who it is not for: anyone looking for wholeness; the film proceeds like two separate stories and they do not join.