A lonely woman forming a bond with a preternaturally clever octopus has the very real danger of tipping into twee. Remarkably Bright Creatures, directed by Olivia Newman (Where the Crawdads Sing), carefully walks the thin line between sanded down Hallmark moments and genuine human connection, and mostly succeeds.

While trading the rich interiority of Shelby Van Pelt’s 2022 novel for outward‑facing visual cues, Remarkably Bright Creatures holds one’s attention thanks mainly to the magnificent Sally Field, who plays Tova, the grieving mum at the centre of the story.

Set in the fictional coastal town of Sowell Bay, Washington, Remarkably Bright Creatures tells the story of Tova, whose son Eric, vanished while sailing 30 years ago. The fact that the anchor line was cut could point to death by suicide, even though Tova is sure it was an accident that killed her boy. She lost her husband to cancer a couple of years ago.

Not one to sit around and mope, Tova works at the local aquarium as the cleaning lady, which is where we meet the second protagonist of the story, a Giant Pacific Octopus named Marcellus.

The fact that Alfred Molina, Doctor Octopus from Spider-Man is the voice of Marcellus, could have felt precious but since Marcellus is so clever (“Humans. For the most part, you are dull and blundering. But occasionally, you can be remarkably bright creatures”) we are willing to forgive it. Also, Molina’s voice work is excellent, on the right side of curious and contained.

A young man, Cameron (Lewis Pullman), drifts into town looking for his father, completing the third angle of the triangle. When Tova sprains her ankle while trying to help Marcellus get back to his tank, Cameron is hired as a temp.

Tova shows him the right way to clean the glass and get gum off the floor. It is a time of change for the people around Tova, from her friends in the knitting club, The Knit-Wits (har har) to Ethan (Colm Meaney), a Scotsman who runs the only grocery store in town, and a dedicated Deadhead with a hopeless passion for Tova.

Everything that can go wrong for Cameron does. His mum dies of an overdose, making him a beat‑up camper, which sets him off on a trip to Sowell in search of his father. He is also the lead guitarist in a Seattle band, which has broken up and moved on.

In Sowell, he meets Avery (Sofia Black‑D’Elia), with whom he might want a relationship but proceeds to mess it up in multiple ways. There is a truth which Marcellus sees way before either Tova or Cameron does.

Olivia Newman, who wrote the screenplay with John Whittington, has made changes to the book that work sporadically. A series would have felt indulgent (unless it were a three‑part miniseries), while the film rushes to slow down. Being under two hours works in the film’s favour, as does Field’s wonderful performance, which brings Tova to life in all her quirky sadness.

Pullman (actor Bill Pullman’s son) embodies the wounded bird you want to protect convincingly, and then there is Marcellus, a wonder created through footage of a real octopus, Agnetha, and CGI, who has “more intelligence in a single tentacle than a human does in its entire skull.”

Remarkably Bright Creatures is currently streaming on Netflix