Review: Widow’s Point

Widow’s Point (Gregory Lamberson, 2019) is a story about a lighthouse. And people. And ghosts of people. And people and ghosts of people that live in a lighthouse. Based on a novel by authors Richard Chizmar and Billy Chizmar, Widow’s Point begins with celebrated author Thomas Livingston (Craig Sheffer) arriving at the Widow’s Point lighthouse. Over the years, there have been numerous, potentially supernatural occurrences, leading to a prevailing belief that the lighthouse is haunted. Livingston has decided to base his next best-seller on this infamous nautical night-light.

Legend has it that the lighthouse is an evil place and that people are not meant to live there. When people live there, people die, and they typically die as a result of mysterious and/or horrific circumstances. Livingston has decided to lock himself in the lighthouse in an attempt to either discredit the legend, or prove its veracity. However, in order to preemptively silence any would-be naysayers, Livingston has rented a complicated A/V setup be installed to capture any supernatural occurrences.

A/V tech Andre (Dominic Luongo) sets up the equipment, and Livingston’s agent, Rosa (KateLynn E. Newberry) monitors the equipment. Everything starts off uneventfully. Having packed some supplies for the weekend, Livingston locks himself in the lighthouse. We are now treated to a series of anthology-style enumerations of some of the lighthouses most notorious incidents.

All seems well, until Livingston discovers the diary of the most well-known of the victims of Widow’s Point, Delaney Collins (Kaelin Lamberson). Suddenly, the A/V equipment begins to malfunction, excluding any and all prying eyes from witnessing the unearthly fate the lighthouse and its otherworldly denizens have planned for the intrepid, yet foolhardy Livingston.

When Widow’s Point began, I figured it was going to be a straightforward anthology piece. I was totally fine with this. I love anthological horror. Sure it can be hit-and-miss, but sometimes it’s nice to consume an entire films-worth of material in successive short film style. Y’know, kind of like the difference between staying in a hotel for a week while on vacation, and only checking in for an hour to patronize a prostitute or shoot some smack. Both are nice distractions from reality, depending on your mood.

However, while partially anthological in nature. Widow’s Point is not a traditional anthology film. In fact, one of the things I enjoyed the most about this flick was the unconventional way in which it presented itself. Usually, the wrap-around story in any anthology film is the weakest of the storylines, and really only exists as a way to unify the otherwise disparate individual stories.

In Widow’s Point, all of the smaller stories exist to serve the main story of Livingston, a mortal man, whose hubris leads him into dangerous terrain that mortal men should fear to tread. This was a nice flip of the script. The proverbial script, not the actual shooting script. Dipping in an out of the intertwining plotlines in a less rigidly-formatted way was a fresh take on a tried-and-true fave.

The performances are all good, but Sheffer is the standout here. His filmography boasts of some real street-cred worthy appearances, as well as a few not-so-worthy ones (Nightbreed anyone?) But in this film he gets to lay it all out on the table. Without offering any spoilers, as the film approaches its conclusion, Livingston’s train begins to careen off the rails. When it finally leaves the tracks for good, Sheffer’s Livingston becomes as scene-chewing and larger than life as one could ask for. He really gets a chance to shine as a performer, once allowed to become totally unhinged. Which is a nice contrast to his permanently-got-all-my-shit-together, NY Times bestselling author we were introduced to at the beginning of the film.

Now, this film, as I mentioned is based on a 2018 novel by the same name. Apparently the author (at least one of them) is fairly well-liked among fans of horror books. I guess he has worked with Stephen King in some capacity in the past and his work has been celebrated by genre fans. There are even folks who are fans of the book that are eagerly awaiting the release of this film. That being said, I have not read this book, and thus, my review was not impacted in any way by the novel.

That is, with one exception. For me, Widow’s Point was basically The Shining (Stanley Kubrick, 1980) at its core. This time, it’s not a hotel with a legacy of violence, probably supernatural in origin, that has claimed numerous victims over the years. It is instead a lighthouse with a similar pedigree. I suppose you could kind of say that about any haunted house story, but for me the similarities between the story that this film tells and the one that The Shining tells were a little too apparent. Not to say that Widow’s Point lacks originality, or is a rip-off. Just that for me it seems to wear its inspiration a little too much on its sleeve.

When I found out that the author of the book worked with Stephen King a bunch, I couldn’t help but think to myself “gotcha.” ESPECIALLY as there is a component of the end of the film that absolutely smacks of the kind of shit Stephen King tends to have happen in his stories at the end. What is that line from Star Wars where Darth Vader says that bit about the student becoming the master? To be honest, I don’t quite know how I really feel about the very end of the film. While I can say that it didn’t ruin the film I had just watched, the conclusion did, as chiseled on the tombstone of pop-culture by one Freedom Williams, “make me go hmmm…”

All in all, Widow’s Point was a fun, slightly-irreverent ghost story, anchored by a charismatic lead. On the flipside, the film was slightly inconsistent, tonally speaking. Occasionally the production values undermine the atmosphere that Lamberson is trying to create. Ultimately however, Widow’s Point ended up being a compelling journey through the rigors of living in a haunted house. It’s got its issues to be sure, but the good outweighs the bad, and in the end I was satisfied.