This feature debut from Scottish writer-director Louis Paxton manages to be funny, profound, anthropological, romantic, and a bit crazy all at the same time.
The story starts when a local council, in its infinite wisdom, decides to remove the two long-term sibling residents of a remote Scottish island, because it is in fact supposed to be an uninhabited place. Isla (Gayle Rankin) and Sandy (Grant O’Rourke) are more than ready to defend themselves against hapless council worker Daniel (Domhnall Gleeson), who arrives to do the evicting. The fact that this brother and sister have been managing by themselves for years is both an out-of-the-gate comedic set-up, and a brilliant way to make madness reasonable.
If these two really had been there all that time, they would of course spend their days raucously fighting each other, engaging in strange rituals, be totally in tune with the ebbs and flows of the island, be busy weaving supernatural explanations into their everyday, and imagine, rightly or wrongly, that they’re communicating with the thousands of gulls who are their neighbours, just like all of our ancestors did.
Premiered at Sundance Film Festival 2026, winning NEXT Innovator Award
Screening at opening night at Edinburgh International Film Festival 2026 Out of Competition
Screening at Melbourne International Film Festival 2026 in Headliners
Written and Directed Louis Paxton
Produced by Shirley O’Connor, Emily Gotto
Cinematography Patrick Golan
Editor Brian Philip Davis
Score Tom Kingston
Starring Domhnall Gleeson, Gayle Rankin, Grant O’Rourke, Emun Elliott, Michelle Gomez, John Hannah
Survival on the island involves hunting seabirds and being in constant high alert for any incomers, and we slowly learn the fearful lessons passed down to Isla and Sandy from their family, and how they’ve ended up out in the middle of the sea by themselves in the first place.
Although cut off from modern society, their days are busy and they have each other. Daniel arrives with his own kind of isolation, surrounded by colleagues and locals over on the mainland, but seemingly friendless and alone.
Out of this crucible the charming threesome develop their own relationships with each other, and find connections they had all thought were out of reach. The islanders elaborate initiation ceremony is one of the funniest scenes in the film, and also speaks to the universality of human community and ritual.
Around the world native and indigenous rites of passage have common threads and echoes, and intimately reflect the natural world around them. Out in the Scottish waters by themselves, this madcap brother and sister have developed not only a ceremony, but also outfits, that could sit alongside the best of ancient Celtic traditions.
And that duality runs throughout the film- it’s saying something very funny and very profound at the same time, which has got to be the best kind of film goal.
Supernatural and magical presences on the island are explained, and not explained, left to the viewer to decide if old Scottish folklore has a ring of truth, or if hallucinations are part and parcel of the human experience and a necessary kind of steadying device in very isolated communities. The fact that such musings involve John Hannah in a wet suit looking like he’s just popped out of an oil slick is the icing on the cake. Occasional flickers of animation find their way into the film, emphasising the multiple narratives and dimensional experiences that can be held by any of us at the same time.
Director Louis Paxton took ten years to write the script, and the depth of all of the oddball characters and the cracking one-liners is testament to that effort.
The Incomer is really a mediation on how there are many types of isolation, how the connective glue of relationships between people is where all the fun and meaning is, and how anyone can go out and find some more joy. And if you’re looking for some more joy yourself, you can do a lot worse than catch this film.
