The Lighthouse is a 2019 psychological thriller horror film directed by Robert Eggers and stars Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe as two lighthouse keepers who lose sanity when a storm leaves them stranded on a mysterious New England island in the 1890s. The film is shot in entirely black and white.
This film has an Edgar Allen Poe meets James Joyce, meets art film feel to it. It starts out really slow, actually very boring, but does eventually pick up, but it then goes in a pattern, intense to slow. It isn’t consistently intense. Some scenes last too long. They go insane from boredom, no other people around, missing their family, the constant sound of the foghorn, cabin fever and drunkenness, so that explains a lot of the bizarre scenes, but there are far too many of those parts.
The two keepers start out as sort of pals, then become best friends, then eventually enemies. They end up hurting each other, physically and mentally. They found out truths about each other, good and bad. They don’t do much but watch, clean, paint, repair, etc. on the lighthouse, fish and trap lobsters, cook clean, eat, sleep, drink and read a few of the books they have. They do sing and dance in a couple of scenes, which are only part of a small portion of happier segments.
This film takes place entirely on the mysterious island, which doesn’t make it extremely interesting, nor entertaining. It is filled with hallucinations, disturbing scenes, depressing parts and slow segments as well. Very little about this film is happy. It has nothing to make you laugh or cry. It is very bizarre and distressing. There is almost too much bizarreness. It needed more happy scenarios.
Both Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe are equally fantastic in this film, but they don’t make the story and the actual film a whole lot better. I hate to say this film was awful, because it has two award winning and outstanding actors in it, but it was still just that bad. Slow, disturbing and depressing and no other setting but that island. I don’t understand how this film has gotten the praise it has, because it doesn’t deserve any of it. I love Pattinson and Dafoe, but they can do MUCH better. 18+ 2/5
Thanks for this review. Willem Dafoe? I am seeking this out.
It was much too slow at times and very bizarre. Both Dafoe and Pattinson did great, but the film wasn’t that good to me. I was disappointed because of all the praise and awards it received.
I have a review coming up for Dafoe’s latest, My Hindu Friend, itself an odd, biographical work of the director. I want to also seek out Dafoe’s two recent one with Abel Ferrera of Ms. 45/Driller Killer fame: Tomasso and Pasolini. Sadly, they have no U.S distribution at this time.