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The Light at the Edge of the World (1971)

Rate: 3
Viewed: 5/26

5/26: Everybody has at least one "what the fuck was I thinking?" film in his oeuvre.

For Kirk Douglas, it's most certainly The Light at the Edge of the World. That's because the script sucks and doesn't faithfully follow the original story by Jules Verne. Details are sparse to make me understand why I got stuck with this piece of crap for over two hours with many mental breaks. The ending is laughable when most pirates are on the ship, conveniently allowing the lightkeeper to fire cannons on it.

Playing the lightkeeper, Kirk Douglas is either running all over the rocky island or making his eyes do the acting for him. There's no doubt of Yul Brynner's commanding presence as Kongre, but what a waste of his talent. I question Kongre's monumentally idiotic decision for letting the lightkeeper go because killing him would've prevented problems down the road. Mental retardation is suspected, especially after he failed to explain his life's purpose.

Some reviewers complained about the brutality, but I thought it was mickey mouse for the most part. Twentysomething pirates on the rocky island and nobody thinks of raping the recently marooned woman? Right. Reviewers said it's strongly implied, but I didn't see any evidence. Also dumb is when pirates are constantly on one side of the island, leaving behind somebody to be picked off by the lightkeeper on the other side.

All in all, despite Henri Decaë's wonderful cinematography, The Light at the Edge of the World is a children's film, but there's little hope of them staying awake for more than half hour.

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