When The Light Breaks

Play trailer

When The Light Breaks

2024

1h 20m

Drama

Play Trailer

Watchlist

Watchlist

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.

Watch on Fandango at Home

Stream Now

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.

Read Critics Reviews

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.

Go to Full Review

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...

Go to Full Review

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.

Go to Full Review

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.

Go to Full Review

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...

Go to Full Review

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.

Go to Full Review

Read all reviews

Andy E

@RT19864765 Jul 20

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.

See more

Read all reviews

Read More

Read Less

WRITE A REVIEW

EDIT REVIEW

POST RATING

Rúnar Rúnarsson

Director

Elín Hall

Una

Mikael Kaaber

Gunni

Katla Njálsdóttir

Klara

Baldur Einarsson

Diddi

Gunnar Hrafn Kristjánsson

Siggi

View more photos

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)