Threshold · 09
THE LIGHTHOUSE
One continuous move up an empty lighthouse at dusk — from the shut door at the foot of the tower, up the spiral stair and through the hatch, to the lamp in the moment it is lit. No narration. The one film in the series where the camera arrives at the light itself.
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The door not yet crossed
The foot of a whitewashed tower in the last direct sun. Dead centre, a plain iron door in a deep stone surround — shut, and the darkest thing in the picture. In the last two seconds it swings open, and the inside is already warm.
Through the wall
The last sun
The foot of the stair, a tungsten lamp on every turn. The camera tips up past a small deep-set west window; the last strip of sunset slides out of frame, and the whole spiral opens overhead.
Up the well
Onto the landing
The watch room door
At the top of the stair an iron door opens, and cool twilight from the watch room windows washes over the warm lamp on the landing. The camera stays on the threshold.
Across the watch room
The hatch
Straight up at the ceiling of the empty watch room. The iron hatch lifts on its hinge, and pale light falls down the ladder from the lantern above.
Up into the lantern
The blinds rise
Inside the lantern the canvas blinds roll up together and the horizon comes in all the way round. On a real lighthouse they are drawn by day, so that the lens cannot focus the sun.
The lamp
The daylight has fallen below the threshold. The lamp strikes, every prism ring lights at once, and the light leaves the lens as a level line across the sea haze — the only lamp event in the film.
The source, and its door
The camera follows that line back to where it starts and stops at the small service door in the lens, open, the lit lamp inside. The same place and shape as the door in the first shot, opposite in polarity. This door, the camera does not cross.
THE LIGHTHOUSE
96 seconds, twelve blocks, one continuous move. One evening and one lamp; the tower is empty; there is not one word on screen.