Cynthia Erivo leads a drama that’s missing essence.

As “Drift” begins, we meet Jacqueline (Cynthia Erivo), a Liberian refugee from a war-torn West Africa, who wanders around the Greek Islands, penniless and alone. She wanders around eating sugar packets and stealing olive oil jars from restaurants to give beach tourists foot massages. And yet, she’s never detained by law enforcers, or told by restaurant managers to get out. She just pretends to book a reservation for her and a group of people, and walks away before she can get in trouble.

She’s haunted by her past, regarding the war in her country, and it has done to her family. Which would obviously leave her speechless. Erivo gives an emotional performance in that sense, but the movie doesn’t really deal with the true nature of it all. It seems to go through the motions from time to time, losing what could have easily been a powerful film. It’s derivative of whatever drama Alexander Makisk’s book “A Marker to Measure Drift” is supposed to convey. It’s supposed to be a movie about healing and bonding, but it doesn’t delve deep into that.

She starts to regain her voice when she meets an American tour guide named Callie (Ali Shawkat), and lies to her about being on vacation with her husband. And maybe this connection could be the start of a new friendship. It’s not as easy as it sounds, because she’s still disturbed by her memories, and I can’t blame her. But at least, Callie is able to sympathize with her pathos, as she previously tried to start a family with her husband, but to no avail.

The flashback sequences also feature Honor Swinton Byrne as Jacqueline’s London girlfriend, but these scenes are inferior to her breakthrough performance in the “Souvenir” movies. In fact, she’s treated like a fly swat when she comes and goes. Whereas the real direction goes within the attacks in her country. There are kids and adults getting violent, and they’re willing to murder people, and that is scary and disgusting. The earlier scenes are teasers, and the later scenes are haunting. If only the overall film reflected on the very nature of the story.

The present sequences, when the main heroine has to be quiet, are also inferior to the ones displayed wisely in the recent “Perfect Days,” but Erivo is the one who carries those scenes with sincerity. A better way to honor this actress, if you missed her shows on Broadway, is to look back at some of her earlier films like “Bad Times at the El Royale” or “Widows,” because she was able to ignite her performances with radiance and attitude. And they were underrated films. Her latest movie “Drift” reflects her tone, but not the character development.

Director Anthony Chen (“Ilo Ilo,” “The Breaking Ice”) makes his English-language film debut with beautiful images of Greece (with the cinematography done by Crystel Fournier), the right leading lady, and real emotions, but the screenplay by Maksik and Susanne Farrel never excels in the drama presented here. It’s all cut and paste, and feels derivative of its racial concept. There’s nothing more for me to say about this.

In Select Theaters