If you’ve seen The Lighthouse (or have yet to), then you may be swooning over some of its many memorable lines. Willem Defoe and Robert Pattinson star as two 19th Century lighthouse keepers who find themselves stranded on a remote island after a terrible storm. The men’s sloppy alcohol-soaked time together produces intimacy, rage and even a hallucination of a mermaid.
Throughout the film, one of the most fascinating aspects is the way the men’s heated arguments and toxic relationship become so funny, often in ways you never expect. The way Defoe’s long drink-fuelled diatribes are met with short, flippant and almost submissive responses from Pattinson is pure poetry.
But that’s not the only reason why The Lighthouse is such a unique piece of work. On a deeper level, the movie examines and illustrates what it means to be a man. The characters’ names alone — Wake and Winslow — are a direct nod to Greek mythology’s Prometheus and Proteus, and the way that fragile masculinity pits males against one another in a struggle for dominance that can only be broken through synthetic and violent means.
Writer-director Eggers, who also made The Witch, a supernatural horror hit in 2015, has created a secluded world that is at once recognizable and eerily unfamiliar. He uses a number of stylistic techniques — including black and white photography and the 1.19:1 aspect ratio popular in the 1920’s — to create an eerie, claustrophobic aesthetic. And he has a terrific supporting cast in Michael Korven and Michael Shannon, who give some of the best performances of their respective careers.