After debuting to rave reviews and stunned reactions at Cannes in May, the first trailer for Robert Eggers’ new film The Lighthouse, starring Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe as lighthouse keepers on an isolated island in the 1890s, is finally here. Eggers had his breakthrough in 2015 with his visionary debut feature The Witch, and the collaboration with Dafoe and Pattinson—rendered in shadowy black and white—is his first project since then. Like his first film, The Lighthouse is another warped, high-concept psychological horror period piece; the unsettling trailer finds an especially craggy-looking Pattinson and Dafoe experiencing the darkest possible side of cabin fever, and Pattinson getting in a seemingly mortal struggle with an octopus.
Earlier this year, Pattinson starred in Claire Denis’ bleak science-fiction epic High Life alongside Juliette Binoche, Mia Goth, Andre Benajmin, and more (you can read our review of the movie here.) Last year, Willem Dafoe appeared in Vox Lux, Bardy Corbet’s film about a pop star played by Natalie Portman featuring original music by Sia and the late Scott Walker. He also starred in the Vincent Van Gogh biopic At Eternity’s Gate, for which he was nominated for Best Actor at the 2019 Oscars. He will appear in Edward Norton’s new film adaptation of Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem, which is set to feature new music by Thom Yorke.
The Lighthouse comes to theaters on October 18. Watch the trailer below.
