When their boat sinks, 3 men make it to an isle they’ll wish they had never found. That is the start point of The Isle (2018), a mystery and horror movie based loosely on Scottish ghostly folklore with inspiration from Greek sirens.
Set in 1846 on a remote island off the west coast of Scotland, a heavy storm causes a merchant ship to sink. The film opens with its three survivors rowing through a thick early morning mist, lost and disorientated. The fog begins to clear and The Isle appears before them. Abandoned except for four sole residents, an old harbor man, a farmer, his niece and a young mad woman, the isle is anything but welcoming. These people clearly haven’t seen anyone from the outside world for some time and their reluctance to help the sailors back to the mainland is evident. Once rested, the three men are desperate to return home but the promised boat never appears. One of the sailors starts to question what happened on the island and why the people abandoned it so quickly. Through his investigation, he discovers that every year around the same date a tragedy at sea would occur and young men from the island would perish. When his two shipmates meet with fatal accidents, the myth of a ghostly siren haunting the island leads him to try and uncover the truth while he battles to save his own life and escape the clutches of the island.
Matthew Butler-Hart, an awarded filmmaker for his short films The Humpersnatch Case (2012) and E’gad, Zombies! (2010), and the comedy thriller feature film Two Down (2015), is the director of The Isle (2018). He also wrote the screenplay together with his frequent collaborator and partner in real life Tori Butler-Hart. Conleth Hill, Alex Hassell, Fisayo Akinade, Tori Butler-Hart, Alix Wilton Regan, Graham Butler, Dickon Tyrrell, Joe Bannister, Emma King, and Ben Lee for the main cast.
The Isle (2018) was part of the line-up in several film festivals along last year, including Manchester Film Festival, East End Film Festival, London Independent Film Festival, Norwich Film Festival, and Berlin Motion Picture Film Festival. Now it is available on DVD and on-demand. Here you can watch the trailer of the movie:
