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Lighthouse [2001]


RRP: £15.99
Our Price: £3.05 (subject to change)

Some films fade into obscurity for a reason
Review date: 2008-06-05 Rating: 2 out of 10

A dogs dinner of a film, absolutely one of the worst films of its type I have experienced to date. I'm surprised the music score hasn't been mentioned, you have to view this film with the remote control on your lap because the dialogue is inaudible unless you have the sound right up and ANY exterior noise, a chair moving etc is four times as loud as the talking. Then the music score randomnly kicks in and you lose your windows so I spent my time turning the volume up, down, trying to pre-empt the music, failing to hear much of the dialogue because often the music was playing RIGHT OVER IT. Unbelievably bad.
The characterisation was awful. The 'hero' of the film who it was established early on in the most cringe worthy contrived fashion was a prisoner who was the victim of a miscarriage of justice just so the audience could like him, the 'beautiful' young criminal psychologist who was just in it to be the vulnerable female who he could save; a couple of benign Laurel and Hardy prisoners chained together, the bad prison guard and a couple of ships crew including Don Warrington who managed to stand out as terrible even in this set-up. Not forgetting the evil serial killer whose role in the film was to saunter from A to B within and outside a lighthouse with not a word to say or action to perform except look slightly peeved to ear splitting 'dramatic' music.
The direction for this film was lamentable. A pointless dream sequence kept being inserted to pad things out that had nothing to do with and no bearing on the proceedings. When music wasn't being used to disguise the black holes in this film, every manner of flashing light was used instead. Right near the end there is a insipid sequence of events whereby the female is shinning up and down a rope 100 feet from the ground hanging from the top of the lighthouse, our hero is having what looks like a fist fight at the top then he decides to join her on the rope leaving the killer to start cutting through it with his knife. Something else happens and the rope is suddenly on fire, we than have the scene where our hero is holding the woman by her hair in one hand whilst holding onto the rope in the other, obviously the director thought this was brilliant and lingered on this action. She than clung onto the frame of a window and the lighthouse wall like spiderman whilst our hero still one handedly carried on his fisticuffs with the villain who was stood at said window. All the while this music is blasting out and lights are flashing everywhere. I would seriously strongly warn anyone with epilepsy to avoid watching this film (as well as the rest of the population) it was incredibly irresponsible, worse than being in the middle of a disco. In fact our hero in the film had epilepsy and had a 5 second fit just to crank up the tension, it transpired he was also having a fit when someone shot his wife and framed him for it (honestly!)
All this nonsense culminated with them both swinging like tarzan into the lighthouse and the whole end portion of the film had the feel of a kiddies adventure movie to it.
Absolutely nothing to recommend.

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Reviews


Dull, derivative British horror
Review date: 2007-08-06 Rating: 4 out of 10

Aware of the low-budget origins of Brit-horror 'Lighthouse', I rented this anticipating a genuine twist on the genre and offering something different to the big-budget splatter-fests America seems to churn out at regular intervals. Although director Simon Hunter deserves praise for aiming for suspense over visceral thrills, this film really is a huge disappointment. There is not one original idea in the woeful script, which is essentially redundant American one-liners limply eschewed in British accents, and the film just isn't scary at all. It's actually criminally boring and you will be counting down the minutes after the first 45 or so.

Every possible horror movie/ serial killer cliche is trotted out over the thankfully moderate running time, including witless characters hiding from the murderous Leo Rook in clearly stupid places and every set-piece designed to shock just feels like it has been done before, better and on a larger budget. The dialogue is not quite excruciating but it is vapid and therefore, it's hard to feel any empathy for the characters whatsoever. James Purefoy wrestles a fairly decent performance out of the tedium but it's not enough to lift this film out of mediocrity.

There are a couple of worthy points however- the production design is fantastically gloomy and gives off a true sense of despair. Hunter is also a stylish enough director who unfortunately just doesn't offer anything new with his shot selection or camerawork. I'm a big fan of low-budget filmmaking but the ideas need to be fresh or movies just end up as low-rent Hollywood re-hashes. Really disappointing and worth only a rent at most.

Entertaining Horror
Review date: 2005-04-05 Rating: 6 out of 10

I rented this movie a few months ago and watched it thinking it was a monster horror movie so I was a little confused when I realised it was about a serial killer! However I enjoyed the dark edgy way it was filmed and the tension that it created, so I bought it. When I watched it again I found that there was less to it than I had remembered (there are flash back scenes in the movie and the first time I watched it I read a lot into them but watching it again I don't know how I got so much meaning from them!) but it is still an enjoyable, tense serial killer horror movie.

Creepy
Review date: 2003-10-01 Rating: 8 out of 10

Shame the DVD has no extras, An effective horror picture, the set pieces and suspence are first rate.

Dire Divel
Review date: 2003-08-20 Rating: 2 out of 10

I had the unfortunate experience of watching this film, and it was so bad after 50 mins I was going to switch it off. I watched, reluctantly, to the end to see just how predictable it could be.
Every tired cliche is used in the film, every 10 minutes or so there is someone who has fallen over and just cant reach that weapon that may save them from the killer... borrring. The film has no atmosphere, is not creepy, the killer is not even scary, the characters haven't got any and why am I bothering writing this??? Watch.... if you are prepared to waste your time and intelligence. Zero out of Five.

Product Details/Specifications


Actor(s):
James Purefoy
Paul Brooke
Christopher Adamson
Rachel Shelley

Creators:
James Purefoy (Primary Contributor)
Paul Brooke (Primary Contributor)

Director(s):

Recording label: Vision Video Ltd.
Manufacturer: Vision Video Ltd.
EAN: 5050582004045
Binding: DVD
Number of items: 1
Format: PAL,
Release date: 2003-04-21
Audience rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
Region code: 2
Running time: 91 minutes
Theatrical release date: 2001
Language: English (Original Language)

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