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The Lighthouse

1) Love the idea of including movies in the media you examine.

2) Your discussion of this movies makes me want to take a look. I was not really interested in this movie, but I will look for it.

3) In your discussion of Prometheus, you compare him with Jesus Christ. I've also read comparisons of Prometheus with Satan (though I don't recall where; maybe Milton or criticism of Milton), as in taking fire/knowledge and giving it to mankind in contradiction of Zeus'/Jehovah's will. Prometheus is punished by being thrown out of Olympus and tortured, while Satan is punished by being cast from Heaven and exiled to Hell. This particular interpretation is a little bit kind to Satan, as it: 1) skips over the whole "leading a rebellious army against Heaven" part and; 2) implies that he is giving the knowledge of good and evil to humanity because he knows that we need it to survive.

11 comments

11 Comments

Ted Vician

Jul 31, 2021

I recently watched The Witch and enjoyed it a lot. I'm not sure it's "weird". It is certainly creepy and unsettling with a side of religious fervor and an ambiguous ending.

Lars Henriks

Jul 21, 2021

Loved this episode and the idea of including movies in general!

While I do think "The Lighthouse" qualifies as "Lovecraftian", due to the maritime setting, the New England connection and the tentacle stuff - I think the major influence on it was Bergman's Färö trilogy, which is so heavily referenced, visually and thematically, I tend to describe this film to friends as "Imagine a Tarantino film if Tarantino had watched Bergman instead of Hong Kong action". Or, ignoring the Färö trilogy, "The Lighthouse" plays like a reply to Bergman's "Persona" (in which two women are isolated on an island together).

Lovecraft aside - The idea of "Weird Fiction" as a film term has so much potential and pulls together such a fascinating collection of films - It's inspiring! I even wrote a blog post about it, after the episode came out.

Should you ever seriously want to expand into the realm of the cinemtatic, here's a short list of "weird fiction" films that would make an interesting start, I think:

- Nosferatu

- The Killing of a Sacred Deer

- A Field in England

- Eraserhead

- The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari

- The Golem

- Werckmeister Harmonies

- Viy (the original, not the remake)

- Mandy

- The Color out of Space (the Richard Stanley version)

- Persona

- Hour of the Wolf

- Under the Skin

- Begotten

- Vampyr

- City of the Living Dead

- Diabel

- Possession

- Midsommar

- The VVitch

- Suspiria (2018)

- Event Horizon

- Hellraiser 1 & 2

- In the Mouth of Madness

- Hausu

Karanthir

Apr 22, 2021

I was disappointed by The Lighthouse when I watched it. I had also seen the very Lovecraftian trailer, and even read a (brief) description of it which included comparisons to Lovecraft. And yeah, that's not what this is at all, but I suppose I couldn't get over my hopes for what the film would be, rather than enjoying it for what it was. I found stuff to like, sure but it just didn't grab me for whatever reason. Especially strange since The VVitch is probably one of my all-time favourite films.

I wonder if the film purposefully sets up Lovecraftian red herrings in order to deconstruct the popularity Lovecraft has attained in the twenty-first century?

Needless to say, after listening to the episode, I really want to watch The Lighthouse again and give it another chance.

pietermerel

Apr 23, 2021

Replying to

"I wonder if the film purposefully sets up Lovecraftian red herrings in order to deconstruct the popularity Lovecraft has attained in the twenty-first century?"

Maybe. I do think the film indeed uses Lovecraftian (and other) tropes to play with the expectations of the viewer. It doesn't play with the notions of cosmicism but only uses the 'visual flags' of Lovecraftian horror.

I understand your disappointment when comparing the movie with The Witch, because that movie CAN be interpreted with supernatural or cosmicist ideas (depending on your interpretation).

I had the benefit that I didn't know who made The Lighthouse when watching it and had but few expectations at all, so I more or less watched it as a Lars von Trier movie and/or a sort of 'symbolical-psychological horror'.

Now I think about it, maybe it can be said that The Lighthouse uses Lovecraftian red herrings to reinterpret the roots of fear (of the unknown): the cosmicist external powers make place to the psychological and cultural-symbolical internal dynamics. This fear of the unknown and unknowable and unexpected within ourselves and in our own world is what affected me when watching the movie, I think, and is one of the main themes in my own stories (influenced by Ligotti and Miéville, no doubt).

Karanthir

Apr 27, 2021

Replying to

Excellent points! I had something a bit more mundane in mind, i.e. the film uses Lovecraftian imagery to draw in people who will watch anything with that description (of whom I am one), and then presents them with something weird but in a very different way. The message being 'there is more to weird media than Lovecraft'.

As to comparisons with The VVitch, of course, every film should stand on its own merits. I think without cosmic horror elements, 'witchcraft in early New England' is the sort of thing I enjoy more than 'two men in a lighthouse'.

G.L. McDorman

Apr 22, 2021

Brandon and I just talked about the Pan's Labyrith score on an episode we recorded! I'll have to check out Steven Wilson, whom I hadn't heard of before -- so thanks for that!

pietermerel

Apr 17, 2021

Yes, some music scores are really good for reading - and writing also. Some examples/tips from my playlist for reading/writing: the scores of 'Pan's Labyrinth', 'Perfume: the Story of a Murderer', 'The Thing' (Alan Howarth version), 'Mama', 'Coraline' and 'Last Day of June' (a computer game-score actualy, but by one of my favorite musicians, Steven Wilson).

pietermerel

Apr 16, 2021

When I saw that this movie would be discussed here and watched a trailer I really wanted to watch it. The trailer was promising and I really like Willem Dafoe (because of him I watched it as a sort of Lars von Trier movie, which was a good way to view it).

I managed to get some references and symbolism out of the film when watching it, but after listening to the podcast realize it's even richer than I thought it was. (So now I want to watch it again.) Apart from that, the acting, the artwork and the atmosphere of the movie are simply great! I think it's one of my all time favorites now. I was also surprised it was done by the same director as The Witch, also one of my favorite movies.

As for the discussion on the podcast: I also think there is no supernatural reality in this movie (sorry).

The movie is called Lovecraftian by many, and of course there is the sea, the tentacles and a remote building, but the type of fear and insanity are not Lovecraftian but clearly Poesk. As I read on the internet, the movie also references to Poe's last (unfinished) story with the posthumous title 'The Light-House' - quote: "Themes of foreboding, isolation and paranoia are apparent in The Light-House. (...) Like many of Poe's works, The Light-House has been studied autobiographically. The lighthouse keeper, then, stands in for Poe himself, who is expressing his own feelings of being alone and isolated and questioning if he can survive." (Wikipedia). If this is so, maybe the reading of the 'Toms' as one and the same person isn't so far-fetched anymore, though I preference the interpretation of two men growing insane and reestablishing folklore as source of wisdom because of isolation and the 'maddening sea'.

G.L. McDorman

Apr 17, 2021

Replying to

I'm glad you loved the film! I was nervous going in simply because I also had seen the trailer and am always nervous about being disappointed. But what a great movie! And I'm with you on the Lovecraftian-ness of the film -- HPL is many writers down on the list of influences here, I think.

I'd love for us to get a chance to cover The Witch as well. I've never seen it, but I listen to the film score a lot while I read.

brandon.budda

Mar 07, 2021

The question of whether Prometheus is identified with either Satan or Jesus Christ is a fascinating one. How Prometheus came to be associated with Lucifer was almost entirely through the Romantic (and in particular Blake's) reading of Milton where he read the Lucifer character as the hero. The Romantics (Shelley and Byron in particular) really liked that idea, that there is something innately heroic to being fully independent, and so ran with Luciferian imagery as long as they could. Once they got criticized enough for doing that, they switched over to Promethean imagery, and so in our time, Prometheus and Lucifer are more closely entwined than prior to Blake's interpretation of Milton.

That's the super short version anyway.

Ted Vician

Mar 07, 2021

Replying to

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein novel is subtitled The Modern Prometheus, so maybe that's where I got it - from some sort of introduction or preface in one of the editions I've read.