This is the final entry in my four-part correspondence with Tony Dayoub of Cinema Viewfinder. We are discussing Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me on the film conversation site To Be (Cont'd). [That site has since gone inactive, but my pieces are available in full on this site and Tony has re-published his on his own site as well - links to all are collected here.]
Three weeks ago I kicked off the conversation with my first entry, "Twin Peaks is Dead - Long Live Laura Palmer!". Tony followed up with "From Poetry to Prose in Fire Walk With Me" and I continued with "Back Door to the Black Lodge".
Lynch's Affinity for Laura Palmer
by Tony Dayoub
Joel,
David Lynch hasn’t released a full-length theatrical feature since 2006’s Inland Empire. This offers us some perspective on his filmography and Fire Walk with Me’s place in it. It’s but the first of a series of films depicting a woman whose dual nature is a signal of internal dissonance. What most intrigues me is how jarring it feels compared with his work up until then, a considerable achievement given the almost mischievous disdain Lynch has for traditional narratives. Even though he started his career with Eraserhead, a stubbornly surreal work, his next two films–The Elephant Man and Dune–both strike me as stabs at legitimacy, a director bringing his unique vision to projects which might allow him mainstream success. Blue Velvet, which looks at the frighteningly dark underbelly of shiny, wholesome small-town America, is the first work that truly feels Lynchian. Then comes TV’s Twin Peaks, which continues along those lines. And right before Fire Walk with Me, Lynch directs Wild at Heart, a noir romance that hints at Lynch’s penchant for the surreal intruding on reality, this time in the form of characters from the movie The Wizard of Oz.
Read the rest of "Lynch's Affinity for Laura Palmer" on Cinema Viewfinder, where Tony published it after To Be Cont'd went inactive.]
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