BEST OF 2019: The Gothic Imagery of THE LIGHTHOUSE
For many, The Lighthouse will prove too dark, too disturbing and perhaps too abstract. I respect that. For the rest of us more peculiar folk, however, The Lighthouse is a dark, deliciously weird, oddly humorous slice of Gothic horror. Yes, it is “arty” and at times even opaque, filled with mythic images and nightmare-scapes begging interpretation. But at its core, Robert Eggers’s latest masterpiece is about two “wickies” (lighthouse keepers) who slowly go mad on a rock so small you’d only barely call it an island. They have nothing to do but complete chores, masturbate, fart (this is the best art house fart movie since Swiss Army Man), get drunk, conspire and — eventually — tire of each other’s company.
Anchoring the film are two Oscar-worthy performances by Robert Patinson as Ephraim Winslow and Willem Dafoe as Thomas Wake. It is a bleak film, but in these actors’ hands it is brimming with pitch-black, odd couple humor; their diametric approaches as actors works wonders. Patinson is developing into one of the more exciting young actors working today and Dafoe is becoming a goddamn legend. Wake is a blustering storm of a character and Dafoe keeps us at just enough of a distance to make us suspicious of his motives, his past and the veracity of his many claims. It is obvious that both men hold secrets, but it is only Winslow who appears weighed down by some mysterious guilt. As he’s driven mad by Wake’s austere demeanor, the toil of chores, repetition, alcoholism and a cancerous psychosis, Patinson’s performance dials up to eleven for something that is darkly funny and rotten.
Dafoe, meanwhile, is both taskmaster and fellow; a superior officer during the day, a highly emotional, scorned caretaker at night — as both men take part in role reversals becoming of their drunkenness. They poison themselves with drink, liquor beading off their beards and mustaches, their shirts damp and flammable. Wake is foul, mysterious and arresting — puffing his chest like some god of the sea made mortal, bellowing curses in between sloppy, liquor-spitting speech.
How was he not nominated again?
I can’t tell you how happy I am that Jarin Blaschke landed an Oscar nomination for his beautiful cinematography. He shoots the film in an old ratio (1.19:1), reminiscent of the silents and early talkies. And in a film that is all about confined spaces, the ratio is appropriately claustrophobic. Blaschke also uses black and white film stock (so little exists that Kodak reportedly had to produce more just for Eggers’s film), creating a look unlike anything I’ve seen in quite some time. There is nothing crisp about this black-and-white. It’s muddier, more painterly. And it makes the rare moments of intense high-exposure that much more shocking and effective. I felt as if I were flipping though a collection of old photos from a previous century, 24 pages a second.
Yes, I love The Lighthouse for how cinematic it is. I drank up these images and I fell in love with these vile men. This was truly one of the great treats of 2019. There’s nothing quite like it.
This film is collection of carefully considered shots and I took each one from the trailer and presented them below. If you dig what you see, I cannot recommend this film enough.
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