Radiant Sea [Lichtes meer] [Mar radiante] *** (2015, Martin Sznur, Jules Sagot) – Classic Movie Review 13,702

The 2015 romantic coming-of-age film Radiant Sea [Lichtes meer] tells of a maritime boy’s work trip over the Atlantic and his dream of love at sea. It’s a tale of two men in a boat, actually the same boat.

Martin Sznur stars in the 2015 film Radiant Sea [Lichtes meer] as German boy Marek, who leaves his parents’ farm in Western Pomerania in his native country to start work as a trainee on a container ship under the complex and tricky conditions of modern cargo shipping. His romantic ideas of life at sea are somewhat dashed when he finds himself cleaning floors and changing toilet rolls.

At Saint-Nazaire he boards the ship, 197 meters long, 30 meters wide, bound for Martinique. Confident and optimistic at the start, Marek soon is all at sea. He seems to seek freedom but instead he falls, perhaps too deeply and too quickly, in love with an enigmatic young gay French sailor called Jean (Jules Sagot), about whom he knows very little. Marek wants to talk. Jean not so much. Sex is just fine for him. They can talk to each other, halting English is their common language. But can they actually communicate? Bond even?

So will it just be a brief encounter fling, a shipboard romance, or will it last forever as Marek would like? Does Jean actually have a lover in every port? Jean seems to be too much of a free spirit for Marek, a man clearly enjoying the kind of freedom he thought he was looking for. It all comes to a head on a two-day break in Martinique, when Jean shows Marek a few things, and Marek has a big surprise for Jean.

[Spoiler alert] On his trip across the Atlantic, Marek may not actually become a sailor, and he does give up, but also he does grow up. The journey proves both immediately exciting and permanently worthwhile.

Director Stefan Butzmühlen’s poetic love story film is a satisfyingly arty, impressionistic movie, mixing plenty of impressionistic sea and sky views with plenty of manly views. The film is seductively sensitive and sensual.

The two actors, both fine figures of masculinity, easily persuade that they are made for each other, if only they will allow it. Though that seems some tall order. Music wise, it runs from sea shanties to Madama Butterfly. This is a very unusual film in many ways, unique probably, and that’s really what makes it so attractive.

© Derek Winnert 2025 – Classic Movie Review 13,702

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