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Earlier this week, I watched The Lighthouse for the first time.
He does a lot of those.
Robert Eggers maritime character study defies categorisation and invites interpretation.
But the biggest twist in the tale is that Ephraim isnt who he says it is.
He has stolen his dead foremans identity and is looking for a new start as a wickie.
But Amazon spoiled it.
I paused The Lighthouse halfway through as my daughter woke up.
Only, Primes x-ray feature told me that there were two characters in this scene.
Thomas Wake (Dafoe), it said, and Thomas Howard (Pattinson).
I knew it couldnt be wrong.
This is a system powered by IMDB.
If it had tagged both actors as playing Thomas Wake, I would have assumed it was an error.
But no, this was clearly two different characters.
And 15 minutes later, Winslow revealed his truth and spilled the beans.
Now this isnt a film that relies on its twist.
The twist doesnt tie the plot together.
Its an unexpected turn of events and helps you to understand the motivations behind Pattinsons character.
Except, in my case, it wasnt unexpected.
It changed the moment from one of shock to one of understanding.
Theres plenty I didnt know, of course.
I didnt know that Winslow was Howards foreman at his previous logging job.
I didnt know that Howard had let him die.
It was still a powerful moment, but it was a moment Id been expecting.
If you could turn off the x-ray overlay, I would have done so years ago.
It doesnt offer me anything that I cant easily Google, and it spoils films in instances like this.
Sorry if I spoiled it for you there.
This unfortunate error is one of the reasons people are abandoning streaming services.
I recently bought Godzilla Minus One on 4K Blu-Ray.
Thats if the film was on any of my subscriptions, which it wasnt.
Physical media has none of these pitfalls.
Ill stick to buying Blu-rays from now on.
In Amazon’s hands, James Bond can never be the cultural powerhouse he was as an independent star.
