Marie-Laure and Werner, the destined soul mates who will eventually meet in the Netflix mini-series “All the Light We Cannot See,” are on opposite sides of a cataclysmic divide.
She is a French teenager delivering coded radio messages to the Allied bombing command in World War II; he is a young Nazi radio technician assigned to track her down in her Saint-Malo garret, as the bombs rain and American troops close in.
Both have met challenges — she is blind, he spent his childhood in an orphanage — and emerged tough and resourceful; Werner is a radio prodigy and Marie-Laure’s senses of touch, smell and hearing are extraordinary.
And they share a mentor, an anonymous broadcaster named the Professor whose lessons, including, “the most important light in the world is the light you cannot see,” have helped to shape their characters.
Marie-Laure and Werner are little people whose problems, when romanticized and cliffhanger-ized, amount to more than a hill of beans.
Persons:
Marie, Laure, Werner, Malo garret, Anthony Doerr, —, Laure’s, Steven Knight, Shawn Levy
Organizations:
Netflix
Locations:
French, Nazi, Saint