Monday, June 7, 2010

Scenes From A Career #5 - The Haunting Faces of David Lynch


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This whole world's wild at heart and weird on top.

5 comments:

Dave said...

Robert Blake's character in Lost Highway still has the ability to give me the creeps whenever he appears in that film.

Such an underrated mystery/horror/whatever you want to label it film... I badly need to watch Lost Highway again soon.

Ed Howard said...

Agreed with Dave. No matter how many times I see that scene with the phone call, it still gives me chills and makes me laugh with delight. It really is an underrated movie, often understood primarily as a warmup for Mulholland Dr., but it deserves to be appreciated on its own merits as well.

Great screencap roundup, Drew.

Unknown said...

Yeah, Robert Blake is incredible in LOST HIGHWAY. Very creepy!

I also found it fascinating that in your montage of stills from Lynch films that there are quite a few that show distorted faces in a very grotesque manner which I think is certainly something that Lynch is fascinating by on a visual level - see also Baron Harkonnen in DUNE.

Drew McIntosh said...

Dave - Totally agree. That character is one of the single most menacing and creepy I think I've ever seen. Would love to hear your thoughts if you get around to watching Lost Highway again.

Ed - Agreed, and so funny you bring up the laughing thing. My dad saw this in the theater back when it came out, and has told me many times the story of the crowd of all 10 or so people in the theater just cracking up in uncomfortable laughter during this scene. It definitely has that effect, where you just have to shake your head and say "Only David Lynch."

J.D. - Thanks, I think it's a very good point that Lynch is so often transfixed on the grotesque, and I think it can be argued that a unique aspect of his cinema deals with finding the beauty within the horror. And then, of course, sometimes it's just all about pure terror.

Strangely enough, I've still not yet seen Dune. Seeing as how Lynch is my favorite director, I should probably get around to that.

Sam Juliano said...

The Blake screen cap is creepy for sure, and the Dennis Hopper cap has a special poignancy in view of his recent passing. Short of an in-depth scholarly examination of the cinema of David Lynch, this all-encompassing visual essay really conveys the hallucinatory and grotesque (aye J.D.) faces and textures that have defined this incomparable auteur. It's a veritable feast for the senses.