Script Analysis: “The Lighthouse” — Scene-By-Scene Breakdown

Here is my take on this exercise from a previous series of posts — How To Read A Screenplay:

After a first pass, it’s time to crack open the script for a deeper analysis and you can do that by creating a scene-by-scene breakdown. It is precisely what it sounds like: A list of all the scenes in the script accompanied by a brief description of the events that transpire.

For purposes of this exercise, I have a slightly different take on scene. Here I am looking not just for individual scenes per se, but a scene or set of scenes that comprise one event or a continuous piece of action. Admittedly this is subjective and there is no right or wrong, the point is simply to break down the script into a series of parts which you then can use dig into the script’s structure and themes.

The value of this exercise:

• We pare down the story to its most constituent parts: Scenes.
• By doing this, we consciously explore the structure of the narrative.
• A scene-by-scene breakdown creates a foundation for even deeper analysis of the story.

Today: The Lighthouse (2019). You can download the script here.

Written by Robert Eggers and Max Eggers.

Plot summary: Two lighthouse keepers try to maintain their sanity whilst living on a remote and mysterious New England island in the 1890s.

The Lighthouse
Scene-By-Scene Breakdown
by Halil Akgunduz
GoIntoTheStory.com

1–3 FOG. Nothing in sight. Slowly, a SMALL STEAMBOAT emerges. A LIGHTHOUSE TENDER.

Shadows stand on the bow of the boat. They might be men, but they could just as easily be ghosts.

A FLASH OF LIGHT breaks through the fog, revealing a silhouette of a bleak stone island. On the highest point of the island stands a tall, crumbling LIGHTHOUSE TOWER.

A TRANSFER BOAT is beached on the shore. TWO UNIFORMED MEN come in and out of the view, carrying supplies. One lags behind.

TWO OTHER MEN exit the one-story CLAPBOARD SHACK. They are the departing LIGHTHOUSE KEEPERS — “WICKIES,” as they refer to themselves.

The four almost exchange glances. But they don’t bother.

The new wickies stand still next to each other, their gazes fixed on the same distant spot. They watch the TENDER depart the island.

OLD lumbers out of the frame, limping a bit, and happy to finally be “home again.”

YOUNG stays standing, staring out. A bit of fear strikes him. There’s no turning back now.

3–5 YOUNG throws down his heavy supplies. He walks through the kitchen and takes a look around…

He enters the sleeping quarters. OLD stands near his bed, PISSING INTO HIS CHAMBER POT.

YOUNG walks to the unoccupied bed and sits down. As soon as he does, OLD FARTS about three feet away from YOUNG’S face.

OLD finishes relieving himself and, leaves the frame, his UNEVEN GAIT disappearing: Walk-drag, walk-drag, walk-drag…

YOUNG feels something strange under him and he finds a small MERMAID carved in ivory. He puts her in his pocket.

YOUNG shovels coal into the furnace…

5–9 It’s dark. The two men sit in the cramped galley. They are going to eat. As YOUNG rolls a cigarette on the table OLD sets down two cups.

He holds his up for a toast — “to four weeks.”

YOUNG refuses to drink. OLD says its bad luck to leave a toast unfinished. They argue a bit, the OLD doesn’t give in.

YOUNG takes his cup and pours water from the farmhouse sink. They toast. Just as soon as they do: YOUNG RETCHES! A terrible taste. He spits into his cup.

OLD smiles, “Aye. The cistern needs a lookin’ to. One of yer duties, lad.” he starts eating.

YOUNG states that he wants to tend the lantern as well but the OLD is adamant about it,

“I tend the light.”

YOUNG shovels more coal into the furnace. ANGRY. He casts a mean glance to the “Instructions to Light-Keepers.” He curses at the manual.

10–12 OLD sits in a sweat, mesmerized by the LIGHT in the LANTERN ROOM. He pours grog into his tin cup. He is not drunk but he wants to be.

YOUNG is staring up at the magical light. He’s outside the signal shed. He lights a cigarette and walks to the shore. HE IS DRAWN TO THE LIGHT from the lighthouse reflecting on the water. He walks into the tide… HYPNOTIZED.

Suddenly a huge log floats toward him. Another log… another. He looks up and sees the sea is full of logs.

He is almost up to his neck in water… Suddenly, he sees: THE BODY OF A MAN floating face down in the logs. And the body starts to float towards him.

YOUNG wants to scream but he is almost totally submerged now…

QUICK CUT TO:

A MERMAID swims in the sea towards the camera.

QUICK CUT TO:

12–14 Water drips on YOUNG’S FACE in the living quarters. OLD orders him to tend to the roof after the cistern and the lamp.

YOUNG lugs a heavy bag of chalk. He opens the hatch of a porridged brick water tank. He pours the chalk and swirls the water around in the cistern.

Then, he is on the roof of the living quarters. He rips out several rotted shingles. There’s a leaky hole. He leans in and sees through the hole: OLD is softly humping his sweaty mattress.

14–15 YOUNG loads up a wheelbarrow overfull with coal. He pushes it down the rock. He makes his way to the door but there’s a SEAGULL standing in the front of the old door, guarding it.

YOUNG flaps his hand, trying to scare it. THE GULL SQUAWKS. It’s missing an eye. A war wound.

SUDDENLY, THE GULL YEOWS, LUNGING at him.

YOUNG HURLS a lump of coal at it. He misses…

The GULL mews this time looks with its single eye and flies away. It flies past the LIGHTHOUSE. YOUNG watches it. The OLD man is looking down at him from the TOWER CATWALK.

15–18 YOUNG carries an OIL DRUM up the stairs of the lighthouse. They are much larger and more imposing than the heavy chalk bag.

He reaches the top of the stairs, the oil drum SLAMS down. He looks up at the hatch of the LANTERN ROOM. He reaches toward the handle… He pushes… But it’s locked.

OLD emerges from the shadow: walk-drag, walk-drag… “You don’t go in there.”

He throws a small, empty, THREE GALLON BRASS OIL CANISTER at YOUNG, taunting him. “Use this next time. Catch yer breath, and bring that drum back down the ladderwell where y’found it. ‘Less yer fixin’ to burn the whole light down.”

OLD climbs the ladder to the LANTERN ROOM. YOUNG watches with spite… OLD pulls out a KEY RING attached to his watch chain. He opens the hatch with the largest key.

18–21 Scrod and potatoes again. YOUNG has his water. OLD pours himself a dram.

They eat in silence. OLD asks him questions but YOUNG doesn’t feel like talking. Then, OLD starts telling him the boredom, the silence is the enemy of the sailors. He says they are eviler than the devil.

YOUNG thinks it’s stupid. Then, he asks the OLD about the last keeper. OLD says he died. “Aye, went mad, he did. First a strangeness. A quietude. Then wild fancies struck him. He believed there were some enchantment in the light.

YOUNG is skeptical about it, “tall tales.”

OLD says. “I seen ye sparrin’ with a gull. Bad luck to kill a sea bird.”

YOUNG doesn’t believe this either. OLD SLAPS HIM IN THE FACE, out of nowhere.

“BAD LUCK TO KILL A SEA BIRD.”

21–23 As YOUNG lies in the bed A SEAGULL starts tapping on the window. As he turns to face it the gull flies away. Back to his bed: the MERMAID CARVING is waiting for him.

He starts masturbating in the supply shed.

YOUNG emerges from the darkness of the shed, smoking. He closes the door behind him and leans against it. He watches the LIGHTHOUSE LIGHT. It illuminates YOUNG.

Suddenly, he notices something odd, A DARK SPOT in the center of the light. He sees a MAN’S SILHOUETTE. Is that OLD… hugging the lens?

YOUNG is startled. He looks again and now, somehow the OLD is on the CATWALK. Surveying.

23–26 YOUNG pushes the wheelbarrow through a storm, an oilcloth tarp over the coal.

YOUNG is polishing the brass in the machine room.

OLD stands in the galley, pointing at the floor in horror. It looks like it always does. He accuses YOUNG of neglecting his duties. But YOUNG has enough of it. They are both furious but in the end OLD tells him if he ever contradicts him again he would dock YOUNG’S wages. YOUNG starts swabbing the floor.

OLD starts singing and as he sings we see YOUNG seeing through his duties: polishing, swabbing, pushing the wheelbarrow through the storm… Then, the wheelbarrow falls. YOUNG wants to scream…

26–29 OLD is looking down from CATWALK of the tower. YOUNG is sitting in a kitchen chair held up by ropes, attached to a jerky BLOCK AND TACKLE.

YOUNG is whitewashing the tower. OLD lets the rope slip a bit it truly scares YOUNG. “Fine work! Yer making high marks in me logbook.”

As they struggle to whitewash the tower in the storm THE PULLEY’S BUSTED WHEEL FLIES OFF sending YOUNG to the ground. YOUNG gets up, covered in whitewash. The SEAGULL with a missing eye pecks him in the leg, scavenging the fresh meat. YOUNG kicks it. The gull flies away.

29–34 OLD finishes writing in his LOG BOOK. YOUNG is hiding in the shadows of the vestibule… WATCHING.

YOUNG tells the OLD that his name is WINSLOW.

OLD asks him why he came to this rock. “What were yer work before?”

YOUNG says, “timber.”

OLD tells him that the sea is for him and he is married to the light. “I’m a wickie and a wickie I is. But tell me Ephraim Winslow, tell me, what’s a timberman want with being a wickie?”

YOUNG tells him he tried every kind of work can pay a man. OLD asks him if he’s on the run or not. YOUNG gets defensive. He starts telling him a story about how he heard about being a lighthouse keeper and how he can earn money. OLD seems he doesn’t buy the story but he doesn’t say anything.

YOUNG asks why is it bad to kill a gull. OLD says, “in ‘em’s the souls o’ sailors what met their maker.”

They are getting familiar now. They toast together.

34–37 As YOUNG is seeing to his duties OLD goes to the LANTERN ROOM.

YOUNG is tossing and turning in bed. Restless. He can’t sleep. He gets up and can’t find his TOBACCO POUCH. He walks up to the machine room to look for it. He finds it and quickly heads down the stairs but something stops him. A feeling.

He looks up at the LIGHT and hears noises. Above… In the LANTERN ROOM. He listens. It’s OLD all right but there’s another noise… sticky, sweaty, slapping of flesh.

YOUNG sees OLD’S TORSO VIBRATING… Just then, white, viscous fluid drips from the grates. YOUNG quickly avoids it in disgust. He looks up again…

A HUGE, SLIMY, TRANSCULENT SQUID’S TENTACLE SLITHERS ACROSS THE IRONWORK. IT DISAPPEARS INTO THE DARKNESS…

37–39 YOUNG pumps water into a cup and drinks it. He pumps again and drinks it. He goes to the pump again to drink it but something stops him. At the bottom of the cup is a dark film.

A SEAGULL starts tapping the window.

He pumps again and sees the water more and more tainted, almost black.

Just then, he hears the cry of a gull, outside.

YOUNG walks up to the cistern. The hatch is open. He sees a DEAD GULL floating in the bloody cistern. ONE SEAGULL is trying to escape. Its wing is broken.

YOUNG hears the loud flutter of wings from above and sees the one-eyed gull. It starts to eat the injured gull. YOUNG tries to intervene but ONE-EYE ATTACKS YOUNG’S FACE. IN ONE SWIFT MOTION, HE GRASPS THE GULL BY THE LEGS AND BEATS IT AGAINST THE EDGE OF THE CISTERN UNTIL IT IS DEAD.

YOUNG breathes heavily. Guilty. He looks to the tower to see if the OLD is watching.

CAMERA BOOMS UP TO THE LIGHTHOUSE TOWER, past the catwalk, past the lamp, past the conical roof to…

THE WEATHERVANE: THE ARROW POINTS WEST… Suddenly, the wind gusts and the ARROW starts spinning around until it stops on the EAST.

39 YOUNG walks to the living quarters wanting to tell about this incident to OLD but he sees OLD is sleeping.

The next day, as YOUNG, polishing the brass in the machine OLD walks up to him telling the wind is changed. He says it’s the calm before storm and they need to board up the signal house. YOUNG doesn’t look OLD in the eye.

40–44 YOUNG and OLD catch LOBSTERS and make a satisfying meal from them. OLD convinces YOUNG to drink with him this time. 
 — LATER

YOUNG and OLD are singing and pounding on the table. They keep drinking. They get closer as they have conversations until YOUNG asks OLD why hasn’t he been tending the light. OLD says he can tend the light on some other rock. He says he is the keeper of this light…

45–47 YOUNG wakes up, so hungover. He wants to drink but there is none. He goes to piss but his and OLD’S pissing chamber pot is filled. He walks out with piss pots and he tosses the contents of the chamber pots off the cliffs…

It all splashes back to his face. The storm has arrived.

YOUNG hauls coal, his face is covered in shit. He stokes the fire. The siren is up and running.

As he is carrying the empty wheelbarrow, he sees something WHITE in the black rocks of the shore. He runs to see a NUDE WOMAN who appears to be DEAD. She is the most beautiful woman he has ever seen. He examines her with fascination, he moves his hand past her waist, toward her genitals, then he sees: SHE HAS A FISH’S TAIL. SHE IS A MERMAID…

She opens her eyes…

YOUNG runs away, fast as he can, flailing, stumbling over himself.

47–50 YOUNG arrives at the living quarters where OLD orders him to clean the mess before the TENDER comes. Then, they wait in their topcoats, looking out to the sea, waiting for the tender. It rains. The wind blows. Hold. The rain begins to pour.

YOUNG and OLD sit at the table perfectly still. Drenched. There’s a huge storm outside. YOUNG realizes the TENDER might not come.

Later, OLD starts to drink as he watches the huge crashing waves. He is trying to rule on the waves, standing there like a magician. He starts to sign. And then, he shouts asking for FATHER NEPTUNE’S forgiveness. He offers him a liquor. And takes another swig himself. Suddenly, a massive wave crashes over OLD, knocking him over.

50–53 YOUNG has his shirt off, shoveling coal. He has bits of rags shoved in his ears, trying to muffle the sound. He has one of OLD’S liquor bottles on his chair, he thinks about drinking it but he uncorks the bottle and lights a cigarette instead. OLD is in the doorway telling him that the damp’s got to the provisions. Some of the food is out. They best be rationing. YOUNG is confused. OLD says its been weeks since they missed the tender. As they talk YOUNG realizes they are stranded there…

53–62 They dig out a WOODEN CRATE full of booze. They start drinking that night as they ration the food. As OLD talks YOUNG becomes suspicious of him and secretly pockets a DINNER KNIFE. He eyes the LOGBOOK.

LATER, YOUNG is drunk and telling OLD about the stuff he has been thru in the forests. And he starts telling him about Winslow. OLD starts to be suspicious of him also as YOUNG asks him how did he eat grass without his teeth. YOUNG says no one can eat grass without teeth. OLD explains: you rip it out and you swallow it…

YOUNG: I don’t know about that. 
OLD: Y’don’t?

YOUNG: I don’t.
OLD: What? 
YOUNG: What?
What? What? What? What? What? They get into a rhythm as the ‘what’s crescendo. And then, suddenly, YOUNG says he wants a steak. OLD is upset that he is not happy with his food. He says YOUNG is fond of his LOBSTER. YOUNG doesn’t say anything. OLD insists but YOUNG doesn’t give in. Then, OLD bursts, LET NEPTUNE STRIKE YOU DEAD, WINSLOW! OLD speaks more powerfully and passionately than any Tamburlaine or Lear. He calls out to the gods of the sea — a man is possessed. He curses on YOUNG.

Then, YOUNG says that he likes his cooking…

63–66 YOUNG is watching the light. Hypnotized. He pulls out the KITCHEN KNIFE and holds it to the light…

He unlaces his boots, and heels up. He creeps towards the TOWER. He slinks up the stairs. He tries to pick the lock of the LANTERN ROOM with a KITCHEN KNIFE. Suddenly, the knife blade breaks into two…

He tiptoes his way to Old’s desk. He opens the desk but the LOGBOOK is gone.

He watches OLD, The LOGBOOK and spectacles rise and fall on his belly. The BRASS KEYS hang on their chain.

YOUNG creeps forward toward OLD, reaches his hand out fishing for the BRASS KEYS, slowly brings the KNIFE out…

The floorboards betray him with a loud GROAN, he throws the knife hand behind his back.

OLD opens his eyes. Orders to YOUNG do his duties.

66–68 YOUNG is pulling up the lobster pot as he starts seeing images… MERMAID’S BREASTS. HER MOUTH. THE LIGHTHOUSE, at a 45-degree angle, LOOKING LIKE A PENIS. THE MERMAID’S SLIMY VAGINA. YOUNG’S HAND TIGHTLY GRIP A CANT HOOK. WET TENTACLES WRITHING. THE MERMAID’S FACE UPSIDE DOWN. SCREAMING, MOANING. EYES ROLLED INTO THE BACK OF HER HEAD…

…

YOUNG is masturbating in the supply shed. He is holding the MERMAID CARVING. Staring at it. It’s not working.

…

IMAGES AGAIN: YOUNG is straddling the MERMAID (the real one, not the carving), his pants half down. FUCKING HER WHILE THE SEA LAPS OVER THEM. The fantasy turns into a nightmare as YOUNG sees A MAN’S FACE, SURROUNDED BY MACKINAW COLLAR, GURGLES, SCREAMING, SUBMERGED IN WATER…

He throws the mermaid carving. It breaks into two. He smiles, crawls to the broken carving and starts wildly stabbing it with the kitchen knife.

…

YOUNG is pulling up the lobster pot again. INSIDE THE POT IS A SHRIVELED CORPSE OF A MAN with ONE EYE.

YOUNG almost falls in the water from terror. Small crabs crawl out of the empty eye socket.

68–76 As the thunder claps, YOUNG and OLD are singing, dancing, swinging each other with linked elbows around the room in circles…

OLD begins diddling “Ten Penny Bit” and dancing a jig. YOUNG joins the diddling and jigging. It’s competitive. Fierce. Mean…

Lightning flashes through the window.

- later

YOUNG and OLD are slow dancing. Arms around each others’ shoulders. Tired. OLD begins singing a haunting ballad. The song changes YOUNG’S mood, he has softened. They lean into each other. It is very tense… It seems like they might kiss… No that’s madness.

YOUNG pushes OLD away. He puts up his fists like old-timey boxers. OLD does, too. They take turns hitting each other. The PLAY-FIGHTING ESCALATES. They start throwing things to each other.

- later

OLD pulls out another bottle and commands YOUNG to drink all of it at once. He does.

- later

BOTH of them pour booze all over their faces.

- later

OLD has his head on YOUNG’S shoulder. They are so drunk that it’s hard to believe. YOUNG says his real name is Thomas… And starts confessing stuff. He confesses that he killed a man, he saw Ephraim Winslow slip and get swallowed by them log and he just stood there and watched. Then, he took his stuff and identity…

YOUNG turns, OLD is gone.

“Why’d y’spill yer beans, Tommy?”

…

YOUNG is in the machine room. The DOOR to the CATWALK flies open. He goes through the door… He sees a BODY lying face down… He walks to the body and sees that it’s HIMSELF.

SOMEONE GRABS HIS WRIST FROM BEHIND. A BRUTAL GRIP. IT SPINS YOUNG AROUND… IT’S OLD, NAKED.

OLD OPENS HIS EYES AND A LIGHT BRIGHTER THAN ANYTHING BATHES YOUNG’S FACE.

77–80 YOUNG RUNS THROUGH THE STORM!

He tries to launch the DORY. Suddenly… OLD SWIPES THROUGH THE AIR WITH A FIRE AXE, SMASHING THE DORY — “Don’t leave me!”

YOUNG escapes into the QUARTERS. OLD chases him. YOUNG tells him that he knows what he did. OLD killed the second. “I found him. Yer one-eyed junior man. In the lobster pot…” and he says that he broke his spell. He throws the broken IVORY MERMAID to OLD. He says that he figured OLD.

Then, OLD starts talking. He says that YOUNG went mad and smashed up the lifeboat and chased OLD with an axe… Better hand me that kitchen knife… YOUNG does so.

…

How long have we been on this rock? Five weeks? Two days? Where are we? Help me to recollect, who are you again, Tommy? I’m probably a fig’ment of your ‘magination. This rock too… Yer probably wand’rin’ through a grove of tag alders, up in the north Canady…

81–88 HONEY DRIBBLES into a BRASS KEROSENE CANISTER. YOUNG TAKES OUT A TIN OF TURPENTINE. He pours it into the canister, too. He begins to stir it with a scrap of rebar… “Thieves’ oil.”

They both drink.

GIGANTIC WAVES CRASH… THE END IS NEAR…

YOUNG and OLD laugh and laugh and laugh, holding cups of thieves’ oil. Suddenly, the force of a wave crashes through a window… Water floods into the room with rapid speed. But YOUNG & OLD don’t notice. They keep laughing…

MORNING

The KITCHEN is an absolute catastrophe. Water drips in a way that suggests the storm is over. The QUARTERS ROOM is half-flooded. YOUNG is pissing, missing the champer pot. Suddenly, he throws up. He falls to his knees… splash… sees… OLD’S LOGBOOK… it floats by… OPEN.

YOUNG begins to leaf through the pages. He reads it. His face drops. Then, he smashes the clock with his fist.

OLD is in the GALLEY, trying to find a match to light his PIPE. Suddenly, the sound of a MATCH striking, OLD turns around, startled… He sees YOUNG with a lit match. YOUNG calmly light his pipe…

Then… he bursts and with a long monologue he tells him that he is sick of him and his smell… Then, he reveals the LOGBOOK. He starts reading all the quotes which indicate YOUNG is not doing his job properly. All lies… Then, he reads the last line…

“SEVERANCE WITHOUT PAY…”

88–98 YOUNG works at getting into the BREEZEWAY toward the TOWER. OLD stands in his way. OLD says that he knows YOUNG killed the gull and he made the wind change… He calls him a DOG…

They ATTACK EACH OTHER AT THE SAME TIME. THEY ARE VIOLENTLY WRESTLING… ANIMALISTIC GRUNTING… BREATHING… SWEATING… LEGS ENTWINED… VEINY THROATS… VEINY BICEPS… SUDDENLY YOUNG LOOKS DOWN…

IT’S EPHRAIM WINSLOW in his mackinaw coat… YOUNG IS IN TERROR. WINSLOW SPITS IN YOUNG’S FACE. YOUNG GOES TO STRANGLE HIM, BUT AS HE DOES, WINSLOW HAS BECOME THE MERMAID… SHE STRANGLES YOUNG… HER TAIL TRASHES … HE TRIES TO GET AWAY. THEN, THE MERMAID BECOMES…

OLD… HE IS NAKED, HIS BEARD IS LONGER, COVERED IN SEAWEED… AND HE HAS ENORMOUS SQUID TENTACLES FOR LEGS…

YOUNG PUNCHES — TENTACLES SQUEEZING HIS THROAT…

OLD: “YER KILLING ME!”

Suddenly, YOUNG looks down, BLOODY, whimpering… He has beaten OLD into pulp…

YOUNG leans on the table… “Bark.”

“BARK, BOY. BARK…”

OLD barks… “Woof.”

…

YOUNG walks OLD on a leash, well, a rope around his neck. OLD crawls on all fours. They walk to the GRAVE-SIZED HOLE they dug out. YOUNG commands him to get in the hole. OLD does so. YOUNG picks up a shovel. He begins to bury OLD…

OLD talks as YOUNG sends mud on his face. And OLD’S last words are “… and, you’ll be punished.”

Long pause… Is he dead? Suddenly, YOUNG panics and jumps into the grave and starts digging OLD with his hands… He lifts OLD up. He takes the BRASS KEYS… YOUNG falls away. He doesn’t see it but several GULLS fly into the frame behind him.

…

He is ready to go into the lantern room at last. But something stops him. He pats his breast pocket… no smokes. He walks to the LIVING QUARTERS, finds his pouch of tobacco. He looks down at the table… the axe is gone… Suddenly,

“LIGHT BELONGS TO ME!” OLD covered in mud, barely alive, swings the AXE, cutting into YOUNG’S SHOULDER. YOUNG picks up the IRON KETTLE and swings around, bashing OLD in the FACE. OLD falls hard to the ground, groaning…

YOUNG picks up the axe. He lifts it high and drives the axe into OLD’S HEAD WITH A BLOOD CURDLING CRUNCH. BLOOD SPLATTERS ACROSS THE ROOM…

…

YOUNG limbs towards the table, rolls a cigarette, smokes it. He pours some turpentine into a nearby cup. And he toasts…

Crawling, trembling, and bleeding, YOUNG slowly works his way to the tower… YOUNG ascends the ladder, slowly, using the KEY, he opens the hatch that leads into the LANTERN ROOM…

THE DAZZLING LIGHT SWIRLING… YOUNG is hypnotized… YOUNG looks ahead… There it is: THE FRESNEL LENS. It is a massive, six-foot-tall jewel of indescribable beauty with eight shimmering brass legs. It seems to sing…

He walks toward it… As if by magic, the LENS’ rotation begins to decelerate … the LENS stops turning… He marvels at it.

Slowly, the doors of the lens open like wings, facing him… The light grows brighter… He takes it in… Pause. A tear falls from his eye. He smiles. Slowly, he puts his hand into the light… His face distorts. He starts to shake with insanity… THE LIGHT GROWS BRIGHTER. YOUNG SCREAMS… He cannot fathom it. He foams at the mouth. He teeters… He’s losing his balance. He’s falling. He falls backward out of the frame. OUT OF THE LANTERN ROOM. INTO THE MACHINE ROOM. AND DOWN THE STAIRS. All the way down the long winding staircase.

THUD. Is he breathing? FADE TO WHITE…

98- PILOT ROCK — DAWN.

YOUNG lies NAKED, bones broken, blind… His eyes are bloody, burnt out sockets. He can’t move. Seaweed is wrapped around him. A seabird pecks at his abdomen… Peck, peck, peck… It’s the ONE-EYED GULL…

It pulls out YOUNG’S liver… Dozens and dozens of BIRDS fly to YOUNG, overwhelming him. Eating him…

CAMERA pulls back to reveal him alone, on PILOT ROCK….

THE END

Writing Exercise: I encourage you to read the script, but short of that, if you’ve seen the movie, go through this scene-by-scene breakdown. What stands out to you about it from a structural standpoint?

To download a PDF of the breakdown for The Lighthouse, click here.

Kudos to Halil Akgündüz for doing the scene-by-scene breakdown.

To see dozens more screenplay scene-by-scene breakdowns, go here.