DIFFERENT, YET THE SAME ‘THE ASSISTANT’ AND ‘THE LIGHTHOUSE’ R. SANDIFORD
For two films which would seem completely different, ‘The Assistant’, about the experiences of a woman in an exploitative workplace, and ‘The Lighthouse’, about two men trapped on an island driving one another insane, it is surprising that both films manage to conjure up a remarkably similar sense of dread, yet through completely different means. ‘The Assistant’ (released in January 2020 and directed by Kitty Green) opens with almost 10 minutes of near silence, as the titular assistant Jane (played by Julia Garner) makes her way to her deserted office building, the New York branch of a film production company, clearly based on Miramax and Harvey Weinstein. It’s through this silence that ‘The Assistant’
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