Mourn David Lynch because we'll never see another one like him
Loved by fans, hated by the suits, Hollywood cannot endure artists like Lynch.
Hi, it’s Dave. I’ve changed the name of this publication (again) to something that better represents what I plan on sharing here. Pieced Together is as much about my ideas as my art, and you’ll see all that come together here.
In the late 1980s, I walked into my friend’s apartment during one of the weirdest moments in cinematic history. In David Lynch’s Eraserhead, a noire acid trip from end to end, there’s a scene called The Woman in the Radiator featuring a coyly smiling woman in a blonde bouffant hairdo and grotesquely bulbous cheeks resembling what can only be described as shaved testicles.
In the scene, the woman side-steps across a small Vaudevillian stage as strange objects resembling fetuses attached to umbilical cords fall from the rafters onto the stage. The woman looks down at them, smiling, and stomps on them, causing them to squish and squeal.
“What the actual fuck are you watching?” The only words that seemed appropriate at that moment.
“Eraserhead!” He said as he finished what was likely his 27th bong hit that afternoon. I was only there to pick him up before we met up with some friends, so we didn’t finish watching, but I was so scarred by the few minutes of the film I was exposed to I didn’t return to it until several years later.
Honestly, if I never see that film again, that’s ok. Not because it’s bad, but because it's disturbingly weird and hard to follow, which pretty much sums up every David Lynch film. That said, Wild at Heart is one of my favorite movies ever. I also loved Mulholland Drive despite the dramatic left turn the movie takes with zero explanation. I couldn’t explain it to you if I tried; you have to see it for yourself.
What made Lynch necessary is that he broke through the walls of Hollywood at the perfect time to create some of the most important and highly-regarded cinema, but the entertainment industry has changed, and if a movie can’t make 8-figures on opening weekend, it won’t get made.
Some of Lynch’s work took decades to gross 8-figures, and some films never got there. In 1986, Blue Velvet grossed $8 million at the box office and hasn’t made a whole lot since. Again, a weird but important film because we’ll likely never see movies like it in the theaters ever again (except maybe that one small art theater that you’ve never been to because it only shows weird movies like Blue Velvet).
Weird movies will continue to get made by small, independent filmmakers. They’ll be uploaded to Vimeo and YouTube. They may even find a home on Netflix, but get lost in the algorithm, seen by only a few thousand people. They won’t make money, and they won’t make anyone famous.
Hollywood is where unhindered (and unhinged) art goes to die, and David Lynch is the last beacon of that. The closest Hollywood gets to that now is a Christopher Nolan time-warped mindfuck like Tenet (which didn’t make it’s money back while it was in theaters, and probably couldn’t be made again).
Nolan’s Memento is also one of my favorite films and even someone of his status in the industry couldn’t get that movie made now. Unless the world turns upside down and we end up in an alternative universe, we will never see real art in the movie theaters ever again.
Instead, we’ll get another version of Jason Statham as a blue-collared worker who also happens to be ex-special forces and takes out bad guys with hammers, cars, or killer bees because that’s what makes money.
Don’t get me wrong, I love a mind-numbing popcorn movie as much as anyone, but it would be nice to see some brave producers take a chance on art once in a while. It won’t happen, but it would be nice.
In the meantime, I’ll be on YouTube looking for some weird shit to watch while making art on my terms.
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Both Wild at Heart and Blue Velvet were mind-shattering to me. W@H was my favorite overall film to this day. Thanks for reminding me. I've got to see if I can locate them.
One film I want to re-watch is "Kalifornia" with Brad Pitt. I cannot find it anywhere. If anyone has some info on it, I would appreciate it. That was one of Pitt's best characters.
I saw Eraserhead in 1981 at the Valhalla cinema, an art house cinema in Melbourne, you know from the days when a cinema had a truly big screen (not this multiplex, barely bigger than your TV BS we have now). It was rated 18+ but no one cared when a bunch of stoner 15 year olds turned up. I loved it and have never laughed so hard in my life. I'd seen it three times when we got a school assignment to write a movie review. Guess what film I reviewed? My teacher nearly had an aneurysm. By the time I met my husband at age 19 I had already seen Eraserhead at the Valhalla 8 times. I took him to see it for one of our first dates. He loved it too, hence we've been together for 40 years. I saw that film well over a dozen times before the Valhalla closed in 1987. I can't imagine what an impoverished experience it must be to only see it on a small screen. Even the giant home screens available now can't come close to seeing Henry's confused head looming 5 metres high.