The ADIFF-hosted world premiere of Phantom Islands took place on February 27th, so unfortunately I have no wild stories of facing terrifying blizzards to reach the theatre after fighting a single parent of 4 for the last half-pan of Brennans. Such a tale would have no place in this review anyway; given the otherworldly space that this film inhabits, more down-to-earth matters would seem like an intrusion.
Phantom Islands takes its name from a line by Irish gothic writer Sheridan le Fanu, but it takes none of his narrative cues with it. Iranian-Irish director Rouzbeh Rashidi originally conceived Phantom Islands as a sort of pseudo-documentary; 2 characters left to their own devices, exploring the Irish coastline. During filming, that concept seemed to fall away, leaving only the bones of the original idea. The remaining space is filled with the ghosts of the land seeping through the lenses.
Rashidi paints a hyper-vivid landscape through his unique use of colour and optics. Oftentimes only the centre of the frame is in focus, leaving the edges basking in an ethereal haze, and coated in the sheen of prismatic light. Shot at the edges of the island, the expanse of the sea seems almost infinite. In one scene, the presence of a pure white horse evokes the myth of Niamh, Óisin, and Tir na nÓg. The actors (Daniel Fawcett and Clara Pais) add to this otherworldly atmosphere, acting in ways that seem alien and exaggerated. On top of this, no single word of dialogue is heard throughout the film – a deliberate homage to silent cinema. The music, an excellent collage of sound by Rashidi and composer Amanda Feery, feels just as vivid as the images on screen.
Within Phantom Islands, there is a consistent awareness of its own medium, waking us from its reverie. This is most prominently displayed by the recurring motif of the Polaroid camera, regularly turning its attention on the filmmakers or, it could be argued, the audience. It brings the film back to its original conceit as a pseudo-documentary, and what is to my mind its main thesis; there is no objective cinema, but that does not mean that we cannot revel in its inherent artifice.
Given the experimental nature of the film, frames of reference for the purpose of recommendation are slightly tricky to come by. Andrei Tarkovsky is a clear (and stated) influence, but through the ethereal haze I saw echoes of more narrative-based fare like Shane Carruth’s Upstream Colour, and Jonathan Glazer’s Under the Skin. The lack of a traditional narrative should not put you off, however; many successful experiments will lead to a bounty of potential. The same is true of the territory explored by Phantom Islands; the West coast has never seemed so unearthly. Now even those of us for whom such magic was lost, can get entranced within the fey nature of our landscape.
Photo Courtesy of The Irish Film Institute.
