A24If you were terrorised by The Witch all those years ago and have been wondering when – or if – you’ll experience anything like it ever since, today’s your day.
Well, not today exactly because the film I’m talking about hasn’t been released yet, but I can tell you all about it so that’s just as good.
The Lighthouse is director Robert Eggers’ follow-up to his 2015 Sundance Film Festival Directing Award-winning The Witch and looks set to be as disturbing – if not more so – than his acclaimed debut.
Check out the trailer for the upcoming film below if you don’t believe me:
Starring Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson as lighthouse keepers (go figure), The Lighthouse is set on a mysterious New England island in the 1890s and follows Dafoe and Pattinson’s characters as they psychologically unravel.
As per Vulture, Pattinson’s character is only supposed to be on watch for a few weeks to help lighthouse keeper Dafoe with some mundane tasks. Obviously, this doesn’t go to plan or I wouldn’t be sat here writing an article about this being the most disturbing film of the year – so there you have it.
As can be seen in the trailer, Pattinson’s character soon begins to lose his mind as ‘the damp and the slog’ gets to him and we see him descend into madness – murdering a seagull, screaming about wanting to fuck a steak, and masturbating to a mermaid figurine to name but a few.
A24The trailer, which also shows Pattinson get into a fight with an octopus, is shot in what appears to be a 1×1 aspect ratio (as per Esquire) and resembles early cinema, with a black and white backdrop and a square format.
Although we don’t know much more about the plot than what we’re presented with in the trailer, we can assume the lighthouse exists in a place where time, well, doesn’t. Exist, that is. ‘How long have we been on this rock? Five weeks? Two days? Help me to recollect,’ Dafoe’s character can be heard asking Pattinson as he looks on with a vacant – and terrifying – stare.
Even if we don’t know much about what to expect though, we do know that the conditions on set were so bad that Pattinson nearly got into a fight with Eggers. Specifically, the conditions which required the actors to be sprayed with water until it ‘stung’.
A24Speaking with Interview Magazine, Pattinson described filming one particular scene where he walks across the beach as ‘torture’.
He explained:
That’s the closest I’ve come to punching a director. However much I love Robert [Eggers], there was a point where I did five takes walking across the beach, and after a while I was like, ‘What the fuck is going on? I feel like you’re just spraying a fire hose in my face.’
And he was like, ‘I am spraying a fire hose in your face.’ It was like some kind of torture. It definitely creates an interesting energy.
The film will be released across select cinemas from October 18, so if you fancy watching Pattinson and Dafoe slowly lose their minds I’d book that date out in your diary.
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A Broadcast Journalism Masters graduate who went on to achieve an NCTJ level 3 Diploma in Journalism, Lucy has done stints at ITV, BBC Inside Out and Key 103. While working as a journalist for UNILAD, Lucy has reported on breaking news stories while also writing features about mental health, cervical screening awareness, and Little Mix (who she is unapologetically obsessed with).