Friday, January 11, 2008

World's Shortest Movie Review: "Lynch" (documentary)


Summary: The mystery filmmaker(s) follow Lynch as he directs Inland Empire (my review of that here), casually exploring his fascination with such things as Philadelphia, derelict factories, dead cattle, Transcendental Meditation and the Maharishi Effect, bugs, world peace, and Bastille Day.

Upsides: Some great, earthy quotes and observations from Lynch, like "If you don't like the doing, do something else." Stuff you probably don't know about Lynch: He calls Laura Dern "Tidbit" ("like a little treat...a little piece of meat or something") , reads the Bible for inspiration (he says he did this with Eraserhead), and believes that artists should be happy and well-rested instead of suffering.

Downsides:

- Like his deaf character in Fire Walk with Me, Lynch usually talks VERY LOUDLY.

- No matter who they are, old people's stories about the good ol' days can be somewhat tedious and weird...

Upside or downside, depending on your point of view: Quirky editing and herky-jerky camerawork. Very unLynchlike. Richard loved it, though. He says it was "amazingly better" than Lynch. (Since Lynch might very well have directed Lynch himself, I guess this is moot.)

Conclusion: I think it would be next-to-impossible to work for Lynch, with instructions like "I need a one-legged teenager and a pet spider monkey...".
A must-see for those intrigued by Lynch and/or the creative process. Anyone else might be bored sh**less.

4 comments:

tshsmom said...

"Anyone else might be bored sh**less."
Yup! ;)

S.M. Elliott said...

I know it. There weren't even many people in the audience. :(

The Zombieslayer said...

It appears your mother's not a Lynch fan. You want to see something weird?

http://blueapples85.blogpsot.com/

It appears your website is popular enough that there are misspelled websites to grab your readers who had too much to drink and can't type correctly.

As for a documentary on Lynch, I don't think I want to know what goes on in his head. It's probably better that way.

S.M. Elliott said...

An online Bible college?! OMG, I hope none of my readers are dyslexic...

Yeah, knowing more about what's in Lynch's head probably isn't a good thing. Every time we watch a Lynch movie we say "That guy is effed up."