''Survival Island'', also known as ''Three'', is a 2005

erotic thriller The erotic thriller is a film subgenre defined as a thriller with a thematic basis in illicit romance or sexual fantasy. Though exact definitions of the erotic thriller can vary, it is generally agreed "bodily danger and pleasure must remain i ...

survival film The survival film is a film genre in which one or more characters make an effort at physical survival. The genre focuses on characters' life-or-death struggles, often set against perilous circumstances. Survival films explore the human will to li ...

written and directed by

Stewart Raffill Stewart Raffill is a British writer and director. Biography Raffill was born in England and grew up near Stratford before immigrating to the US and working in the motion picture industry. His writing and directing work in film and TV spans s ...

and starring

Billy Zane William George Zane Jr. (born February 24, 1966) is an American actor. His breakthrough role was in the Australian film ''Dead Calm (film), Dead Calm'' (1989), a performance that earned him a nomination for the Chicago Film Critics Association, ...

Kelly Brook Kelly Brook (born Kelly Anne Parsons, 23 November 1979) is an English model, actress, and media personality. She began her career modelling for a range of advertising campaigns, which led to her discovery by the editorial team of the '' Daily ...

, and

Juan Pablo Di Pace Juan Pablo Di Pace (born 25 July 1979) is an Argentine actor. He began his career in the United Kingdom, performing in a number of musicals and appearing in films like ''Survival Island'' (2005) and '' Mamma Mia!'' (2008). He later moved to Spain ...

Plot

Jack and Jennifer are a wealthy couple who are

yachting Yachting is recreational boating activities using medium/large-sized boats or small ships collectively called yachts. Yachting is distinguished from other forms of boating mainly by the priority focus on comfort and luxury, the dependence on ma ...

in the

Caribbean The Caribbean ( , ; ; ; ) is a region in the middle of the Americas centered around the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, mostly overlapping with the West Indies. Bordered by North America to the north, Central America ...

during

Christmas Christmas is an annual festival commemorating Nativity of Jesus, the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a Religion, religious and Culture, cultural celebration among billions of people Observance of Christmas by coun ...

. One of their crew is the handsome Manuel, who is immediately found attractive by Jennifer and her friend Gail. Shortly after, Manuel is cursed by his angry ex-girlfriend Maria as he prepares to leave on the yacht. He is clearly bothered and has a difficult time fulfilling requests, particularly for Jack who becomes irritated. Manuel also begins to be infatuated with Jennifer after overhearing her having

sex Sex is the biological trait that determines whether a sexually reproducing organism produces male or female gametes. During sexual reproduction, a male and a female gamete fuse to form a zygote, which develops into an offspring that inheri ...

with Jack in their cabin. When Captain Richards confronts him, Manuel quits and throws down a rag as he storms out of the

galley A galley is a type of ship optimised for propulsion by oars. Galleys were historically used for naval warfare, warfare, Maritime transport, trade, and piracy mostly in the seas surrounding Europe. It developed in the Mediterranean world during ...

. The rag lands on a gas flame and causes the entire yacht to catch fire. Captain Richards is unable to control the blaze with a fire extinguisher so they abandon ship. Their lifeboats are capsized by a storm later that night and everyone becomes separated. Washing up on a deserted island, Jennifer is completely alone until she sees the body of Captain Richards in the water. As she attempts to

resuscitate Resuscitation is the process of correcting physiological disorders (such as lack of breathing or heartbeat) in an acutely ill patient. It is an important part of intensive care medicine, anesthesiology, trauma surgery and emergency medicine. ...

him, Manuel appears and also unsuccessfully tries to revive him. They bury his body and under Manuel's guidance, set out to build a hut for shelter and find food. Two days later while fishing near a reef, Manuel finds Jack alive and brings him back to Jennifer and their hut. Although Jack is grateful at first, he eventually suspects Manuel of having desires on his wife and declares the man his enemy, promising to ruin his life once they get off the island. This puts Jennifer in the uncomfortable position of her loyalty to Jack conflicting with the realization that they both need Manuel's help to survive. A proud man, Jack insists that he can provide for them both, but it quickly becomes apparent that he cannot. Jack and Jennifer's relationship starts quickly deteriorating. Jack steals Manuel's goggles to go fishing one day and when Manuel discovers this, he threatens to kill Jack. Jennifer attempts to get him to calm down. As the two exit the water after fighting, Manuel pins Jennifer down and starts to

rape Rape is a type of sexual assault involving sexual intercourse, or other forms of sexual penetration, carried out against a person without consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or against a person ...

her as a way of getting revenge on Jack, but she soon stops resisting and falls for him, and they have sex. Afterwards, Jennifer feels remorse despite having enjoyed the encounter and Manuel confesses his love for her. When Jack returns, Jennifer accidentally hints at him what had happened and he furiously rejects her. While fishing another day, Jack finds a boat on the ocean floor. He drags it to shore and attempts to repair it. That night, Manuel and Jennifer go for a midnight swim as Jack watches them from a distance. As they start having sex, she gives him the idea of stealing the boat while Jack is out fishing so they can get away together from the island. The following morning, they manage to steal the boat and sail, however they do not get far before the boat begins to sink and they realize that Jack's plan all along was for them to take the boat and

drown Drowning is a type of suffocation induced by the submersion of the mouth and nose in a liquid. Submersion injury refers to both drowning and near-miss incidents. Most instances of fatal drowning occur alone or in situations where others presen ...

. They are forced to swim back to the island and to Jack, who attacks the exhausted Manuel with a spear and kidnaps Jennifer. Manuel rescues her that night but gets wounded in the process and becomes sick. The next day, Jack tracks down the pair and finds them on top of a branch of a tree. He throws one of his spears to a weakened Manuel, who loses his balance and falls to the ground. Before Jack could kill him, Jennifer pins Jack to the ground, attempting to kill him with his own knife. Manuel picks up a heavy rock with which to crush Jack but he loses his balance again and falls backward, impaling himself on one of Jack's spears. Simultaneously, Maria performs a

voodoo Voodoo may refer to: Religions * West African Vodún, a religion practiced by Gbe-speaking ethnic groups * African diaspora religions, a list of related religions sometimes called Vodou/Voodoo ** Candomblé Jejé, also known as Brazilian Vodu ...

ceremony and impales Manuel's

effigy An effigy is a sculptural representation, often life-size, of a specific person or a prototypical figure. The term is mostly used for the makeshift dummies used for symbolic punishment in political protests and for the figures burned in certain ...

on a spike. One year later, a yachting family drops anchor near the island and explores it, discovering Jennifer asleep in her hut. She, still somewhat distraught over Manuel's death, leaves with them, but does not mention that Jack, who she has been forced to live with and depend on since Manuel's death, is also on the island. Jack, who is fishing, sees her leaving on the yacht and calls out, but Jennifer, who had also stolen his lighter so he could not make any more fires, finally exacts revenge on him by ignoring him and the family inside the boat cannot hear him. Jack is abandoned on the island and his eventual fate is left ambiguous.

Cast

as Jack *

as Jennifer *

as Manuel * Maria Victoria Di Pace as Maria * Todd Collins as Bill * Gabrielle Jourdan as Gail *

Gary Brockette Gary "Tex" Brockette (September 13, 1947Ancestry.com. Texas Birth Index, 1903–1997 atabase on-line Provo, UT, USA: The Generations Network, Inc., 2005. Original data: Texas. Texas Birth Index, 1903–1997. Texas: Texas Department of State Healt ...

as Captain Richards * Isabelle Constantini as Maggie Richards

Production

The film was produced during 2003 and was originally set for cinema release under the title ''Three'' in 2004.

Principal photography Principal photography is the phase of producing a film or television show in which the bulk of shooting takes place, as distinct from the phases of pre-production and post-production. Personnel Besides the main film personnel, such as the ...

started in April 2004 at

Eleuthera Eleuthera () refers both to a single island in the archipelagic state of the The Bahamas, Commonwealth of the Bahamas and to its associated group of smaller islands. Eleuthera forms a part of the Great Bahama Bank. The island of Eleuthera incor ...

in the Bahamas and lasted for seven weeks. In 2005,

and

unsuccessfully challenged the film's producers to remove Brook's nude scenes from the movie.

Release

Theatrical

''Survival Island'' went on

limited theatrical release __FORCETOC__ Limited theatrical release is a film distribution strategy of releasing a new film in a few cinemas across a country, typically art house theaters in major metropolitan markets. Since 1994, a limited theatrical release in the Unite ...

on 3 May 2006 in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

before being released to DVD on 21 August 2006. The cinematic release lasted for just one week in many cinemas.

Home media

''Survival Island'' was released on

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for digital video disc or digital versatile disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any ki ...

in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

on 15 August 2006. It was also released theatrically in a number of European countries under its original title, ''Three''. Actors Billy Zane and Kelly Brook met during the course of filming in 2004 and later became engaged. In 2005, Zane and Brook challenged the film's producers to remove Brook's

nude scenes In film, nudity may be either graphic or suggestive, such as when a person appears to be naked but is covered by a sheet. Since the birth of film, depictions of any form of sexuality have been controversial, and in the case of most nude scenes, ...

from the movie, however, the eventual DVD release kept these scenes intact.

Reception

Critical response

''Survival Island'' received mostly negative reviews. On

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

, the film has an approval rating of based on reviews from critics. The relationships between the characters in the film were heavily criticised. The '' Daily Press'' called the film "Not the best retelling of the rich-poor love triangle..." ''Three,'' as it was known in the UK, suffered from poor reviews, gaining a rare one-star rating on the BBC Movies website. Robert Hanks of ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'' said " 'Three'' isan unholy amalgam of ''

Lord of the Flies ''Lord of the Flies'' is the 1954 debut novel of British author William Golding. The plot concerns a group of prepubescent British boys who are stranded on an uninhabited island and their disastrous attempts to govern themselves that led to ...

'', '' The Blue Lagoon'' and ''

The Admirable Crichton ''The Admirable Crichton'' is a comic stage play written in 1902 by J. M. Barrie. Origins Barrie took the title from the sobriquet of a fellow Scotland, Scot, the polymath James Crichton, a 16th-century genius and athlete. The epigram-loving E ...

'' ... At odd moments it rises to risibility, but mostly it is just dull". In a review for ''

Empire An empire is a political unit made up of several territories, military outpost (military), outposts, and peoples, "usually created by conquest, and divided between a hegemony, dominant center and subordinate peripheries". The center of the ...

'', Adam Smith described the film as "appalling". Anna Smith of '' Time Out'' criticised the film's tone in her review saying, "the dramatic score and writhing sex scenes imply an erotic thriller, but the camera treats pneumatic Brook like the subject of a cheap porno and the plot bears little resemblance to either genre. As the survivors bicker and allegiances change, it's hard to fathom their motivation or to glean what allegiances we, the audience, are expected to make". ''

Total Film ''Total Film'' was a British film magazine published 13 times a year (published monthly with a summer issue added, between the July and August issues, every year since issue 91, 2004) by Future Publishing. The magazine was launched in 1997 and of ...

'' rated it one star out of five, while Patrick Mullen of ''

Medium Medium may refer to: Aircraft *Medium bomber, a class of warplane * Tecma Medium, a French hang glider design Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''The Medium'' (1921 film), a German silent film * ''The Medium'' (1951 film), a film vers ...

'' gave the film a rating of 3/10.

Accolades

Wins *

Golden Trailer Awards The Golden Trailer Awards are an American annual award show for film trailers founded in 1999. The awards also honor the best work in all areas of film and video game marketing, including posters, television advertisements and other media, in 10 ...

: Golden Trailer – Trashiest (2006)

References

External links

* * {{Stewart Raffill 2005 films 2005 thriller films 2000s erotic drama films 2000s erotic thriller films 2005 independent films Films about adultery American erotic thriller films American erotic drama films American independent films British erotic thriller films British erotic drama films British independent films English-language Luxembourgian films 2000s English-language films Films about survivors of seafaring accidents or incidents Films set in the Caribbean Films set on uninhabited islands Films directed by Stewart Raffill Films about rape Films about sexuality 2000s survival films Films scored by Richard Harvey (composer) 2005 drama films 2000s American films 2000s British films English-language independent films English-language erotic drama films English-language erotic thriller films English-language adventure films