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1[[quoteright:325:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/2de8a6213b43c63cc955112edd4e2bb2_0.jpg]]
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3''The Light at the Edge of the World'' is a 1971 film directed by Kevin Billington and starring Creator/KirkDouglas, Creator/YulBrynner and Creator/SamanthaEggar. It is based on the 1905 adventure novel ''The Lighthouse at the End of the World'' (''Le Phare du bout du monde'') by Creator/JulesVerne (written in 1901 but published a few months after Verne's death).
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5In 1865, William "Will" Denton (Douglas) is a jaded American miner who seeks to escape a troubled past and becomes a lighthouse keeper on a rocky island in the Tierra del Fuego archipelago, at the southern tip of UsefulNotes/SouthAmerica. One day, a crew of pirates led by Captain Jonathan Kongre (Brynner) land on the island, murder everyone they can find and extinguish the light so they can mislead ships into the rocks and prey upon them. Denton manages to escape the massacre and goes on a guerilla campaign against the pirates.
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7!!''The Light at the Edge of the World'' contains the following tropes:
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9* BaldOfEvil: The cruel BigBad is played by the famously bald Yul Brynner.
10* DieHardOnAnX: It predates the TropeNamer by a good 17 years, but still, it's pretty much ''"Film/DieHard on a Lighthouse Island in 1865"''.
11* DisneyVillainDeath: Kongre wants to kill Denton by setting the lighthouse on fire with oil lamps, but he only manages to surround himself with flames and falls to his death from the top of the lighthouse.
12* FauxAffablyEvil: Kongre does his best to appear more civilized than his men in his manners, especially towards Arabella, but he's still cruel at the core.
13* FlayingAlive: Montefiori is captured, tied to a sail and flayed alive by the pirates with harpoons. Denton decides to [[MercyKill shoot him from afar so he won't suffer anymore]].
14* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Twofold:
15** The pirate ship is sunk by Denton using a cannon that the pirates left on land.
16** Kongre perishes due to the fire he set up himself with oil lamps, falling to his death as he's surrounded by flames.
17* LighthousePoint: The whole story is set in and around a lighthouse. It concerns bad guys who are dead set on keeping it extinguished so they'll make ships crash on rocks and prey on the wrecks, and a lighthouse keeper who's the only one left to stop them.
18* ManOnFire: In the climax, Kongre is set on fire by the flames he caused and falls from the top of the lighthouse.
19* MercyKill: Denton shoots Montefiori dead while the latter is being [[FlayingAlive flayed alive]] by the pirates so he won't suffer anymore.
20* {{Pirate}}s: Jonathan Kongre and his crew. While they dress garishly like pirates of old would, they're closer in behavior and mindset to RuthlessModernPirates. After all, they were "modern" by Jules Verne's lifetime.
21* SacrificialLamb: Montefiori, who's just there to show how far the pirates' cruelty can go. He gets flayed alive and dies.
22* SoleSurvivor:
23** Denton is the only survivor of the massacre when the pirates land on his lighthouse's island.
24** Montefiori is the only survivor after his ship gets wrecked by the pirates, as he's rescued by Denton. Alas, not for long...
25* SpannerInTheWorks: The pirates could have continued wrecking ships for a while if not for a very determined and lone Will Denton.

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