Lighthouse film review- by The Reel Rejects

Full text transcript of the Lighthouse film review:

What is Willem Dafoe from the Lighthouse say to a woman who is recently engaged? How long have you been wearing that rock? Great great comedy here. We’re going to talk about the White House today. By myself, don’t ask me why. Well, I’ll tell you why John didn’t watch it. He left me abandoned here. The Lighthouse is a psychological horror film. It stars Batman and the Green Goblin. It’s about to light housekeepers who slowly descend into madness when a storm hits the remote island they are stationed. The film is directed by Robert Eggers, the director of the Which, a film. I greatly appreciate it. And it is written by him and his brother Max. And the film is inspired by what goes on behind the scenes of the real rejects. Someone asked us on Patrón recently, do we differentiate between what is a movie and what is a film? And for cases like this, I’d say, yes, this movie is definitely more of a film. This is cinema. This is not those theme parks Oscar says he keeps talking about. Can’t wait for the Irishman to keep a lookout for a review next week. It’s produced by 824. And if you’re familiar with any of their films, you would know damn well you’re walking into some type of strange art house terror that would probably not be for the masses. I would see this being a little bit more of a crowd splitter as a film lover, as a lover of film.

I think there’s so much to appreciate here. It takes place in the late 19th century. So Eggers opted to capture this film in black and white, and it’s capture with a ratio of one to 19 to one, one by 19 by one, one point nineteen by one, one nineteen. I thought it was for three. And it really helps with the immersion of the experience and the overall time period. The phrase lived in keeps coming to mind. I would say the best way to appreciate this movie would be in the theaters. I’m not sure how much you could really appreciate this at home unless you turn off all the lights in your house and then the building in the neighborhood and blasted the shit out of your speakers. But do keep in mind, if you go to the theaters, it’s only going to take up the center of whatever screen you’re watching at home. And a choice like this can sometimes feel like pretentious or it can feel like a gimmick, like what I’m doing right now. But this wasn’t the case for me when I was watching it. For me, it enhanced the time period. There are times of the way they do just the overall sound design of capturing the dialogue or the surroundings, the atmosphere and the symmetry of the shots and its editing. Just the overall way this film is composed, it often feels like you’re watching a movie from many decades ago.

I got the impression that a lot of the calculated choices were based on the question of how would they have captured this scene or this moment way back when. I don’t know if that’s the case. It just sort of felt that way. The modern day touches of the certain shots they decided to get or certain editing choices when it felt like out of a movie from today, it felt spare’s in that department. And I think the black and white elements really helped to enhance the hollow, stark bleakness of this experience, of this journey that these characters are on. And a lot of ways, if they shot this in color, I think it drastically would have detracted. And this movie is pretty much just to people Willem Dafoe and Batman would and Robert Pattinson. And they are both undeniably absolutely terrific here. They both feel plucked out of this time period. This town is like a great big check in order to get the center line from Scarface. Both of these roles are and I think the word has been going around like it’s a risk taking roles. They’re incredibly vulnerable, daring portrayals, and they balance each other out perfectly. I think because of the rather bombastic performance that Willem Dafoe gives, a lot of the electrifying praise of the performer will be dished out to him. Admittedly, the accent. He does it with the attention to detail they have with the dialogue, especially with his character.

There were times early on where I wished for subtitles because I had a thought of, wow, this really does sound like it’s from this time period, especially because I have no idea what the hell he’s talking about. Right. Overall, though, still able to absorb this maddening performance. He’s so off putting in all the right ways and there’s such a lived in history with his portrayal. And, yeah, I mean, there’s still plenty of dialogue. I did understand it was enough for me to understand what was going on and what he was really talking about. And Robert Pattinson, while he evidently has some very big moments in the movie, most of the film takes a much more subtle approach with his character, Willem Dafoe. He kind of start he’s already a little bit crazy. He’s the older man with a lot more experience. He’s shepherding Robert Pattinson. And Robert Pattinson character is still new to all this lighthouse work, the isolation of this job. So I think it’s easy to look at the large, grandiose performance of defo as the main highlight. But in all honesty, I think they’re both equal, since this is a lot more internal until the madness overtakes them and a lot more becomes external later on in the film. I genuinely love, love, love the music here. It’s haunting, harrowing, unsettling. It feels classical horror. When I was Johnny down some notes for this movie, I didn’t watch a trailer. I just listen to the music, the things that I really, really loved.

Out of it was the mood, the tone and the pacing. It’s a slow build it movie really takes its time. It has some very deliberate pacing and it all encapsulates this like dreadful, eerie, grim filled descent. It requires a patient viewer, OK? You think you’re walking into it, Chapter three, The St-, the case, all right. It’s an ambitious story, an ambiguous tale. And there’s some very clear mythological inspirations. There’s evidently a lot of themes about power and masculinity. There’s some very evident H.P. Lovecraft inspirations. And for someone who has recently been playing a Catholic and read Shadow Over Innsmouth this year, I really appreciated that. I mean, the trailer hints at some stuff you see like a little bit of this squid creature in there. I mean, this movie has a lot of strange, surreal, but it plain and simple, frickin bizarre things that occur. Some stuff can just be downright unsettling and some stuff is just uncomfortable to watch all of this, which can ultimately lead into many different interpretations of what this film is all about. It’s been fun hearing what some people think of what every little nugget of details about that are things I’ve heard or I’m like, oh, I didn’t pick up on that at all. But I could kind of see your point. And I appreciate that. And to sum it up, I would say that this is a film that I heavily appreciate it.

And with that being said, I can’t actually say I love this movie. I liked it and I admired it so much. Yet there’s just one crucial thing, and this is like the real ticker for me. It might sound odd considering how much I praise the performances of Pattinson and Dafoe. It’s just to put it plain and simple, I couldn’t give two shits about them. I don’t think characters I don’t know everything, just like the main character even necessarily needs to be likable or relatable. I don’t need to save the cat thing for every movie, but I generally felt too much of a distance with these characters for my personal taste. Above all else. As a viewer, I need to feel truly invested in at least one of these characters, especially to go on a journey like this. And for some reason I just didn’t. I appreciate heavily the craft of this film and the commitment of the performer so much, but I never felt invested or connected to either one of them, which I ultimately think detracted from the experience for me. This movie is being pitched a psychological horror film. Maybe if I cared about the characters at all, I would have felt the horror side. I definitely felt the psychological, maddening side of it. But this was not really scary. Like it’s scary in a different way, not your conventional nowadays blockbuster horror movies. It’s a different kind of scary. But even giving it that credit and with that perspective, because I wasn’t really invested in them, I just I didn’t really care what happens to them.

In some ways I can see how my gripe with that can be someone else’s reasoning for why this film works for them. So much for why they might love this film. As some of my colleagues and I that’s that’s not the point of the film. And actually, it’s kind of the point that there’s a bit of a distance or there’s supposed to be more of an observational piece like I get it. And I would never try to sway someone away from loving this movie for that particular reason. That’s just my personal opinion. Like for me, for this to be for any movie, for for it to be something I love, I got to be pretty invested. At least one of the characters, especially when I watch only two people on screen. Overall, though, I would still give this film like a four out of five. When I first walked out, I was more like a three out of five of the movie. But it’s definitely grown on me a lot since I saw it a couple of days ago. They’re just way too much to appreciate here. I still think more movies like this, especially in the horror department, should be getting made a lot more often. And I think there’s plenty to consider come award season, like even with the script in and of itself, I don’t think I touch on it enough.

I know I mentioned Willem Dafoe dialogue. I really, really appreciated how authentic the dialogue sounded, especially because, you know, reading some H.P. Lovecraft material, New England characters and stuff, I was like, this feels like I’m reading that kind of book again. And those kind of characters are speakings. Eggers brothers really do have a strong knack for authenticity of dialogue from time periods, not of today. The music, again, is great. The way it’s composed and shot is wonderful. Despite me not really connecting with the characters, the performances are brilliant, everything from a technical scale. This is crafted beautifully and more and more people should watch it. Love to know what you guys thought of this film. Did it live up to the hype? What’s your interpretation of it? Leave a comment below. You guys can subscribe to the real regex. Click that notification. They get notified every time we got a YouTube video up, you could download and follow us in the Stardust app. Completely free to use. We post daily usually before we do an official YouTube video review. We got our opinion up there first. We do a lot of posts there for things that we’re not covering up on YouTube Loving’s we just catch up on or whatever. There’s plenty of other influencers who are over there you can post your own reactions to. So that link is in the description box. You have a happy Halloween.