Lost in the Movies: Images from a return to Twin Peaks (1 of 2): The In-Between Years and a Detour into Lynchland

The second collection, to be published here in March, will feature many other screenshots from Part 5

Here are screenshots of all the juxtapositions, superimpositions, titles, collage-like mosaics or other visual manipulations from the first half of my video essay series Journey Through Twin Peaks Part 5 - "Over the Mountain Pass". I included (far fewer) image highlights with the cross-posts for Parts 1, 2, and 3; for Part 4 I needed a whole separate post full of screenshots and now I obviously need double that for Part 5! I'll share the second half in a week or two (update: postponed by several months), depending on when I finish the last of these videos. You can see these images in their original video context in my cross-posts for chapters 29, 30, and 31-33. However, these images aren't simply teasers for the videos - I hope in this format, where they can be lingered over, they fuel new contemplation and enjoyment.

Though most of this line-up appears in the order of the videos, it begins with one of the most fun passages to create, in which I juxtapose Lynch's stylistic evolution over the course of his film career from 1977 to 2006 with the six Twin Peaks episodes he directed in 1990 and 1991. It's amazing how they serve as a microcosm of that larger pattern.

The pilot, like his early black-and-white films, is calm and concentrated...

...precise as clockwork in execution...

...while cultivating a brooding atmosphere.

His only subsequent season one contribution, like his colorful eighties and nineties breakthroughs, opens up to a sunnier, more playful disposition without abandoning his signature darkness...

...cultivating a hip joie de vivre that captures the spirit of the time around its own making.

The season two premiere, the beginning of a process that would lead to Lynch's most controversial film represents a sharp turn, a messy transition toward more depth, complexity, and commitment that alienated newly won-over audiences.

The follow-up is much tighter but even more attuned to new frequencies.

The grand, climactic reveal dances between yearning distance...

...and horrifying immersion, a bittersweet, triumphant marriage of dramatic resonance and aesthetic revolution.

While the season two finale closes the cycle off by radically privileging and embracing an improvisational spirit, just like Lynch's last feature.