31 Days of Halloween: The Lighthouse

 2019, Robert Eggers (The VVitch) -- Amazon

OK, what the fuck did I just watch. That was a beautiful, loud, disturbing movie that I am just not sure if I got anything from other than being impressed. For one, no, not horror despite the brief glimpses at things better left in other lighthouse movies. This was an arthouse flick about isolation and madness, but to be honest, after surviving 2020, 4 weeks on a rock with a farting, angry madman seems pretty par for the course. The real madness came from what was said, what was not said and a lingering guilt that just ate at him like a seagull picking at an errant french frie.

Winslow (Robert Pattinson, The Batman) has taken a job as lighthouse support under Thomas (Willem Dafoe, Odd Thomas), a maddening, demanding lighthouse keeper whose only joy seems to be the drink, and denying anyone else from seeing the lamp. The job is supposed to last only 4 weeks, guessing it does the job in month long shifts to allow for some mental recovery. But it doesn't take more than 2 weeks for the cracks begin to show behind Winslow's veneer, despite filling his days with hard, hard labour and monotonous tasks. 

There is much sub-text. Much. There is more to these men than this rock allows to be seen. And that is what the movie is about, not the occasional mermaid fantasy (oh, so THAT'S how you have sex with a mermaid), not Shakespearian level acting references to Poseidon, not the random tentacles slithering in the stormy winds. If the movie soars over all, it is in the performances. Wow, Willem Dafoe is never better than when ranting up a barely comprehensible storm of Sea Captain patois. Pattinson is conversely clear and coherent, but perhaps all more the mad man for it.

P.S. Dude, you NEVER dump your bedpan into the wind, everyone knows that.