FILM REVIEW: The Light Between Oceans

It's ages since I've seen a good weepie.

Thankfully, Denis Cianfrance's tragic, windswept romance ticks all the boxes if you're looking for a story with a bit of emotional wallop - spectacular scenery, romance, heartbreak, levity, a beautiful score (courtesy of Alexandre Desplat) and two immaculate performances from Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander.

In 1918, near-wordless, war-weary Tom (Fassbender) is posted to man the lighthouse on a isolated Australian island, but not before having caught the eye of local girl Isabel (Vikander).

With 100 miles between them, the pair's romance takes time to blossom but they eventually make a life together in the lee of the lighthouse.

Heartache strikes twice, but they have new hope when a baby is washed up on the shore in a rowing boat?

Do they keep her, and save her from an orphanage? Or alert the authorities? And which of those options is the right thing to do?

I'll not give any more away, save to say their choice throws a fresh shadow on the couple's life, and has far-reaching consequences.

Cianfrance allows plenty of running time for Tom's early days on the island and the central couple's early, happy together. Some might say too long, but I enjoyed the easy pace and could have watched Fassbender and Vikander together forever, such is their connection and so beautifully painted is their developing love and marriage.

The director benefits from having cast two of the finest actors of our age, who just happened to hit it off so well on-camera and off they are now a real-life couple.

Rachel Weisz also excels as the grieving, barely held-together mum of a little mite lost at sea, but the true third character in the drama is the environment, Cianfrance and cinematographer Adam Arkapaw stepping back on occasion and allowing the landscape to charm us and also taking us out into one particularly brutal storm. We're left in no doubt life on the island can be both idyllic and horrific, and that's just the weather!

With outstanding performances from its two leads, a perfectly-realised period setting - the light is distinctly sepia toned at times - and no shortage of heartstring-tugging moments, this is melodrama at its best.

Sure it's emotionally manipulative, but isn't that the point of a weepie? See it on that basis and you won't be disappointed - but if the reaction of at least three of my fellow cinema-goers is anything to go by, make sure you take a tissue. And if you don't want to hug your family as soon as you get home, you must be made of stone.