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I really enjoyed this movie. The acting and writing is excellent and it explores the Atlantic lighthouse culture during during the 17-19th centuries which not a lot of mainstream movies touch on. It does a good job expanding on superstitions, taboos, and social dogmas that I find really interesting.
Oct 18, 2019 · Robert Eggers’s new film, starring Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe, is an enthralling exploration of the mania of isolation.
- Robert Eggers
The Lighthouse: Directed by Robert Eggers. With Robert Pattinson, Willem Dafoe, Valeriia Karaman, Logan Hawkes. Two lighthouse keepers try to maintain their sanity while living on a remote and mysterious New England island in the 1890s.
May 19, 2019 · The Lighthouse, the sophomore effort from The Witch writer/director Robert Eggers, screened early Sunday morning; the character-focused 19th century ghost story, which also stars the great Willem...
- Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson go toe-to-toe in The Witch director’s sophomore effort.
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- Verdict
By Chris Tilly
Updated: Apr 28, 2020 10:31 pm
Posted: Sep 12, 2019 1:15 am
This is an advance review out of the Toronto International Film Festival. The Lighthouse opens in the US on Oct. 18 and in the UK on Jan. 17, 2020.
You can watch our video review for The Lighthouse in the player above.
Robert Eggers clearly enjoys challenging himself, his cast, and his audience. The writer-director’s feature debut – 2015’s The Witch – was set in 1650s New England, shot using only candles and natural light, and performed via the formal language of the period. His follow-up feature moves forward in time – to the 1890s – and features a pair of bona fide movie stars in the shape of Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson. Yet if anything, it’s an even more challenging watch, shot in bleak black and white (using a square 1.19:1 aspect ratio), again utilizing the vernacular of the time, and revolving around a premise that poses more questions and offers fewer answers than its predecessor.
There’s tension between the pair from the off, Wake wishing to delve into Winslow’s mysterious past, and endeavoring to frighten him with myths and legends, telling tales of deadly sirens and enchantments in the light, and making claims that his predecessor went mad and promptly died.
That tension builds, and is exacerbated by Wake’s hard drinking, and Winslow’s ghastly visions of horrors on the shore. Are the terrifying images in his mind? Or is there some malevolent force at work? Needless to say, matters eventually come to a head in harrowing fashion.
Watch the latest trailer for The Lighthouse below:
That’s about it in terms of story. But The Lighthouse is less about plot, and more about psychological warfare. The power struggle between Wake and Winslow is riveting, the men wanting to punch each other one minute, and kiss each other the next, in between the singing, arguing and dancing.
Pattinson, meanwhile, is all pent-up anger and simmering rage, biting his tongue until he can chew it no more, then exploding through a terrifying tirade that makes you fear for Gotham’s crooks when he plays Batman.
Both actors are given thrilling dialogue to exchange, with Eggers and his brother/co-screenwriter Max using 19th Century author Sarah Orne Jewell’s work as a guide. Their love of language bleeds through every scene, the words instantly transporting you to the time and place, and enriching the characters’ back-and-forths.
Still not sure just how weird The Lighthouse is? Then watch the trailer:
The cold, stark photography also helps set the scene, breeding a horribly oppressive atmosphere, and mirroring the harsh and unforgiving conditions the men face throughout. Yet in spite of the many hardships presented onscreen, Eggers and his cast find humour in the misery, through clever wordplay, a spot of slapstick, and Winslow’s ongoing battle with a seagull. Indeed, if “Black Phillip” was The Witch’s breakout character, launching a thousand memes, so this malevolent bird now has a shot at fame.
Robert Eggers’ sophomore effort should do for remote lighthouses what The Shining did for remote hotels, the film being less a battle of wits, and more a question of who will lose their wits first. Both Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson have never been better, which is really saying something. And as a rumination on loneliness, desolation, and madn...
- Chris Tilly
May 19, 2019 · The Lighthouse. Willem Dafoe. Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe star as 1890s Maine lighthouse keepers locked in a battle of wills as a storm rages inside and out in 'The Lighthouse,' the new...
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Oct 25, 2019 · Driven by its stars' maniacal performances, The Lighthouse makes for an impeccably crafted, though thematically uneven, blend of horror and humor. Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe star in Robert Eggers' horror film.
