The Vanishing Is a Phenomenally Well-Made Thriller

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Originally and less vaguely entitled Keepers, the thriller The Vanishingdramatizes the story of three lighthouse keepers (one young, one middle-aged, one getting up there) who resided for a time on a rocky, storm-swept island in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides before vanishing four days before Christmas, 1900. We know in advance that the story won’t end happily, so the question is: Will we learn anything about human nature in extremis en route to the foreordained catastrophe?