SOS! Please get me off this island.

“Eden” is the latest movie directed by Ron Howard, and it’s an attractive one. It’s based on a true story about European settlers settling on Floreana Island, which is located on the Galápagos Islands. It was filmed in parts of Australia and on the Galapagos Islands, and it looks great, especially with the makeshift homes and farms, which were used to try to help these people survive.

But for a movie directed by the same man who gave us hits like “Apollo 11,” “A Beautiful Mind,” “Rush,” and more recently “Thirteen Lives,” “Eden” is a miss. But it wouldn’t be his first miss. He’s a dependable filmmaker who has his highs and lows. I think the problem is that the screenplay by Noah Pink (who also created “Genius” for National Geographic) is so flimsy and soapy with characters arguing and being negative for most of the movie. Even when you do see some high spirits, you start to loose that magic and go back to the negativity. It’s ends up being unfocused.

Set in 1929, it tells the story of a family-consisting of Heinz (Daniel Bruhl) and Margret Whittmer (Sydney Sweeney) and his tuberculosis-stricken son Harry (Jonathan Tittel) from a previous marriage-who leave all their worldly possessions behind and start anew on Floreana Island, as inspired by Dr. Friedrich Ritter (Jude Law) and his spouse Dora (Vanessa Kirby). All of these people wanted to settle on the island to escape from fascism, but I don’t think these people have anything else in common. This couple is not too thrilled to have these people in their mists, and their life isn’t as ideal as the family believed it to be (“Nothing about our life here is magical,” and “Do not be fooled by our success,” Friedrich says).

So far, the family’s new life is miserable-with lots of bugs, barely any source of water (No rivers or streams, just a rain harvester), and a cave dug out by pirates to sleep in. But they manage to grow crops and Margaret is pregnant.

There are some neighbor tropes, like Margret acting like a dotty neighbor, while Friedrich is in the middle of writing his manuscript, especially when she wears a sun hat.

And here’s the biggest trope: the snooty new neighbor. Ana de Armas comes in as Eloise Bosquet de Wagner Wehrhorn, a self proclaimed Baroness with the slogan: “I am the embodiment of perfection.” That’s why she gets carried on a beach and rides on a donkey with someone holding an umbrella, like she’s Cleopatra or someone. She’s developing a luxury hotel on the island. You bet she is.

But even the original inhabitants-remember that’s Friedrich and Dora-have reached a breaking point. For example, when they run out of food, and he starts stealing some canned food, she tries to remind him of the principles he taught. But the only principle he believes in, at this point, is eating. He blames his loss of sanity on the arrival of the Whittmer family, but of course, the wife has to say: “You ruined your life.” and “You betrayed the cause.”

The cinematography by Mathias Herndl makes the island look gorgeous through the highs and lows of the character’s lives. If the movie wanted to explore the lives of people who are trying to escape from fascism, then it should have explored more on the notion and less on the whiny and negativity. How could anyone survive in these conditions if they had to follow certain principles? Maybe that’s what Howard and Pink were trying to go for in “Eden,” but I got tired of the same thing happening over and over again. If I were stranded on this island with these people, I would have immediately made an S.O.S. on the beach.