When The Light Breaks

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When The Light Breaks

2024

1h 20m

Drama

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Tomatometer

Popcornmeter

97%

Tomatometer

31 Reviews

Popcornmeter

Fewer than 50 Ratings

When the light breaks on a long summer’s day in Iceland. From one sunset to another, Una, a young art student encounters love, friendship, sorrow and beauty.

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Critics Consensus

When the Light Breaks is a quietly powerful and deeply moving work of minimalist cinema, using its sparse narrative and sensory approach to craft an intimate, authentic portrait of grief.

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Jonathan Romney

Sight & Sound

Nov 4

Rúnarsson has sharply caught the mood of a dominant strain of Gen-Z culture, the prevailing melancholy that defines so much current pop, Hall’s own songs included.

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Kevin Maher

The Times (UK)

05/23/2025

3/5

Runarsson makes a virtue out of this narrative simplicity, however, and delivers the equivalent of sweetly moving “slow” cinema, where we get to luxuriate in the characters for long, long, sometimes wordless takes...

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Tara Brady

Irish Times

05/22/2025

4/5

Composed of small gestures and unspoken truths, it’s a bonsai miniature of the vastness of overwhelming grief.

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Ellen E Jones

Observer (UK)

Oct 8

Hall is a fine actor whose elfin face registers every ripple of grief emanating from that first shock of impact. This performance... casts these intense emotions in a useful new light.

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Nick Hasted

The Arts Desk

05/28/2025

4/5

Rúnarsson is less interested in death than the responses it wrenches from lives on adulthood’s cusp. It’s a slight yet profound tale told over 80 concise minutes...

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Emma Simmonds

Radio Times

05/23/2025

4/5

This is a nuanced, intimate, and hopeful look at an unfathomable situation that says so much in its short runtime.

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Andy E

@RT19864765 07/20/2025

This was a pretty gloomy film. An exploration of grief suffered by a group of friends when one of their friends dies suddenly. Very simple plot. I wish I'd known before I bought the ticket.

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Rúnar Rúnarsson

Director

Elín Hall

Una

Mikael Kaaber

Gunni

Katla Njálsdóttir

Klara

Baldur Einarsson

Diddi

Gunnar Hrafn Kristjánsson

Siggi

Awards Leaderboard: Best Movies of 2024

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Synopsis

When the light breaks on a long summer’s day in Iceland. From one sunset to another, Una, a young art student encounters love, friendship, sorrow and beauty.

Director: Rúnar Rúnarsson
Producer: Heather Millard, Rúnar Rúnarsson
Screenwriter: Rúnar Rúnarsson
Production Co: Compass Films
Genre: Drama
Original Language: Icelandic
Runtime: 1h 20m
Aspect Ratio: Flat (1.85:1)