The Summer Book

A small girl spends the summer with her grandmother and her father on a small island in the Gulf of Finland. Her mother has recently died. There is nobody else on the island; the house is small, the weather changes, and there is nothing particular to do all day. Sophia and her grandmother walk about, argue, make up and talk. The father is silent much of the time. Charlie McDowell directs from a screenplay by Robert Jones. Glenn Close plays the grandmother, Emily Matthews plays Sophia and Anders Danielsen Lie plays the father. The source is Tove Jansson's novel of 1972. Jansson is known as the author of the Moomin books, and this is the best known of the books she wrote for adults; it came out of her own life on a summer island. It was shot on sixteen millimetre by Sturla Brandth Grøvlen, and the texture comes from that choice. The narrative is not built on event; the sections are short and loosely joined, as in the book. Grief is never discussed directly. It screened at the London film festival in October 2024 and opened first in Finland in January 2025. Glenn Close's part is not a lovable grandmother; she is played as cantankerous, impatient and aware that death is near. Who it is for: viewers who like quiet family drama and literary adaptation. Who it is not for: nothing happens, the pace is very slow, and the film builds no emotional peak anywhere.