“Life is long.”
For a young girl and her family, a summer at their island summer cabin is filled with many things: boredom, excitement, discovery, loss, the passing of wisdom, and through it all, hope. The Summer Book, from director Charlie McDowell, based on the book by Tove Jansson, is a meditatively paced story of moving to new life.
Tween-ager Sophia (Emily Matthews) is spending the summer at her grandmother’s (Glenn Close) island cabin along with her father (Anders Danielsen Lie). It is their first summer there since the death of her mother, which is never actually disclosed as such, but it is clearly a factor in the summer. Her father is consumed with keeping busy, either at work as an illustrator or caring for a fallen poplar that he is determined to bring back to life.
That leaves Grandmother to keep Sophia occupied through telling memories, teaching about nature, exploring the island (or a neighbor’s island marked “no trespassing”, which Grandmother calls a provocation). Grandmother’s age is showing. She is nearing the end of life. She lays in bed one night posed, as if in a coffin. But Father and Sophia may not quite understand that reality yet.
The summer is told through several vignettes. It’s not so much a flow, as a series of moments, just as Sophia’s Summer Book will be pictures and artifacts that will be the basis of her memories of the summer. The film’s pace is very like being on a remote island. Days build on days. It just happens as it comes. It may seem a bit slow, or perhaps we might think of it as relaxed.
One of the interesting events takes place when the three of them go for a day at an abandoned light house. Sophia tells God she’s bored and prays for a storm or something. When that storm materializes and puts her father in danger, she tries to undo it. We note that Sophia misunderstands prayer as a kind of magic that gives her control over things. So she then blames herself for all that has happened. Of course, this faulty view of prayer is not limited to children.
For me, a key to the film is in Father’s tenacity in the attempt to restore the fallen tree to life. Given the recent death in the family, this seems like a desperate struggle to have hope in resurrection and new life.
That hope of new life is what each of the characters need as they look toward the future. Sophia is soon to be leaving childhood. Father is struggling to know how to relate to his daughter as a single father. Grandmother is facing the inevitable prospect of death—not with fear, but with resignation, and perhaps even acceptance.
The Summer Book is in select theaters.
Photos courtesy of Music Box Films.
