| |
|
 |
Eraserhead |
This is the most outlandish and strange mainstream film you'll probably ever see. In fact it's just plain bonkers. You know you're on shakey ground when the cast list includes 'The lady in the radiator'. This was David Lynch's first full length feature film, and it was made over a long period while he was attending university. A lot of the content of this film is a metaphorical depiction of his fears and anxieties about his own life at the time; he was newly married, with a pregnant wife and living in a bad neighbourhood trying to make ends meet, complete his education and finish filming what would become Eraserhead. Watching this film is good preparation for the weirdness you'll witness in some of Lynch's later films. |
 |
The Elephant Man |
I find this a hard film to watch as it is so painfully sad. It's the true story of John Merrick, a man so hideously disfigured he can hardly stand up and can't sleep lying down. John Hurt, as Merrick, is superb under acres of prosthetics and gives a performance of such tragic grace that the viewer feels tremendous empathy with him even before he is subjected to any ordeals or cruelties by his tormentors. Anthony Hopkins, as the doctor who takes Merrick in to study him, and later to care for him is superb and Freddie Jones as his owner in a carnival attraction is as evil a baddie as you could imagine. The black and white photography is particularly effective in suggesting Victorian London's grubby industrial landscapes. |
 |
Dune |
Dune is one of my favourite books, and I believe most of the people who liked the book had a problem with this adaptation. I didn't have any problem at all - I liked it a lot and I don't think anyone else could have done as good job as David Lynch did with it. Kyle McLachlan was a good choice to play Paul Atreides, the supporting cast were all excellent and the story - a complicated one - was told as concisely as was practical. The sound design on this film is a major feature which adds greatly to the atmosphere and the cinematography by Freddie Francis is nicely done. Sting let's the side down a bit and Kenneth McMillan's performance as the Baron Harkonnen is over the top, but all in all I enjoyed this film a lot. |
 |
Blue Velvet |
Blue Velvet is the first major David Lynch film proper. We've taken a left turn from the films prior to this and it we're travelling down a new road with many twists and turns and detours. Kyle McLachlan stars as a high school kid with a nose for intrigue. The start of the movie finds him walking through the woods on his way home from school when he stumbles across a human ear. He takes it to the local police station and next thing you know he's embroiled with the local psycho gangster - a disturbingly convincing performance by Dennis Hopper - and all sorts of other shady goings on. This is a midnight rollercoaster of a movie which has you on the edge of your seat wondering what madness lies round the next corner. |
 |
Wild At Heart |
Wild At Heart is typical David Lynch fare. We have Nicholas Cage and Laura Dern as young tearaways looking for excitement on the open road. But Cage runs foul of Dern's mother and lands up in the penitentiary. We join the two as Sailor is released from jail and off they go in search of true love and happiness. But all is not well, and soon private detectives, local gangsters and hitmen all start to converge on the scene. There is a thread running through the film that mirrors Dorothy's quest in The Wizard of Oz, to which Sailor is constantly alluding, and the soundtrack features some wild thrash metal - a weird combination if ever there was one. Sheer over the top madness from start to finish. |
 |
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me |
Lynch decided to expand on the television series with this full length feature which traces the story of Laura Palmer up to and including her death. Most of the cast returns in some capacity and as it's a feature film there's scope for being much more explicit about the sex and violence hinted at in the TV show, and there are some exquisite set-pieces that just wouldn't have been possible on television. The scene in the nightclub with the subtitles is inspired - nobody has ever tinkered with sound to such great effect as David Lynch - and the scenes in the Black Lodge are exceedingly disturbing. |
| |
Lost Highway |
 |
Lost Highway was considered a return to form for David Lynch after the disappointment of Twin Peaks. Bill Pullman and Patricia Arquette star in this ultra weird story of ...well I'm not really sure. I tried my best to follow what was going on, but when the main character just disappears or becomes someone else or something half way through the film, it kind of throws you off your stride. Bill Pullman turns into Balthazaar Getty midway through the film, and his girlfriend Patricia Arquette becomes an evil Arquette. Anyway, you've just got to go with the flow and soak it all up. The imagery and sound design, the weird visuals and scary situations conveyed in a menacing tone are what this film is all about and I liked it a lot. Bill Pullman does an excellent job and even Patricia Arquette is good in this film - in both parts! |
| |
The Straight Story |
 |
David Lynch directs a Disney film. Nobody saw that one coming. It's a more conventional, and strictly linear, true story of Alvin Straight, a man who decides to make peace with his estranged brother who lives a few states away. The only problem is that he is unable to get there by conventional means so he sets off in his riding mower on a journey that will thus take him quite a while. As it turns out Richard Farnsworth, the actor who plays Alvin, was dying of cancer while this movie was filming and every emotion you can imagine is written up there on his face. He gives a magnificent performance as a man who has lived a full life and has learned a lot of things in his time, and wants to be at peace with the world and those close to him before he dies. Although not typical of his work, it's one of Lynch's best films. |
| |
Mulholland Drive |
 |
This is what we've come to expect from a David Lynch film: Fun with sound, disturbing imagery, strange characters saying strange things, one character turning into another - or maybe not. I thought this film was excellent. It was nominated for an Oscar, but the chances of it winning were slim to say the least. It's about a young woman who comes to Hollywood to become an actress and there seems to be two versions running simultaneously of what happens to her once she arrives; one where she quickly becomes happy and succesful and one where she struggles and is unhappy, but there are some very strange goings on in both versions. There are a couple of scenes which stuck with me; one at the back of the diner with the homeless bum, and one with the nightclub singer. I get the feeling Lynch got closer than he's ever been to getting what's in his head on to film with this one |
| |
Inland Empire |
 |
Lynch continues his journey of the mind with this horrific tale of madness, obsession, murder, revenge and ghostly dreamscapes. Laura Dern is astounding as a fading Hollywood actress given a part in a film which will surely signal her comeback, but there's a catch: the script was from an old Polish film where murder was afoot and prduction stopped - rumour has it it's haunted. We follow Dern's descent into madness over three hours of the most bizarre cinema you'll ever encounter. Lynch filmed this entirely on digital video over the course of four years, and has intercut his internet feature 'Rabbits' throughout. If this is what's inside David Lynch's head - and I believe he's done it one hundred percent this time - then that's a pretty scary, but thoroughly fascinating place to be. I think this may be genius. |
