Richard Beymer's Twin Peaks photos
December 6, 2007 11:05 AM Subscribe
Photographs taken on the set of Twin Peaks by Richard Beymer (who played Benjamin Horne).
What xmutex said about Twin Peaks -- you can also apply to Ren & Stimpy.
Seriously.
posted by davidmsc at 11:15 AM on December 6, 2007
Seriously.
posted by davidmsc at 11:15 AM on December 6, 2007
Single link post on a niche T.V. show from the early 90s?
Fucking awesome! Thanks.
posted by KevinSkomsvold at 11:17 AM on December 6, 2007
Fucking awesome! Thanks.
posted by KevinSkomsvold at 11:17 AM on December 6, 2007
Wow Bob wow.
posted by picea at 11:17 AM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
posted by picea at 11:17 AM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
man this is awesome. I love twin peaks. although I wish David Lynch was a little less ADD and more willing to properly complete his projects. between this and mulholland drive I'm losing my faith in the man's ability to actually finish something in any way that's satisfying.
posted by shmegegge at 11:18 AM on December 6, 2007
posted by shmegegge at 11:18 AM on December 6, 2007
between this and mulholland drive I'm losing my faith in the man's ability to actually finish something in any way that's satisfying.
I have to disagree and say that Mulholland Drive is the best thing he's ever done and, if Inland Empire is any indication, likely to remain so.
posted by xmutex at 11:19 AM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
I have to disagree and say that Mulholland Drive is the best thing he's ever done and, if Inland Empire is any indication, likely to remain so.
posted by xmutex at 11:19 AM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
Looks like all these shots came from the shooting of the final episode. Nice that Beymer thought to preserve this off screen point of view for posterity.
I wonder what sort of camera he was shooting with.Great depth of field in those portraits.
posted by JBennett at 11:22 AM on December 6, 2007
I wonder what sort of camera he was shooting with.Great depth of field in those portraits.
posted by JBennett at 11:22 AM on December 6, 2007
looks like that gum i like has come back in style.
posted by uaudio at 11:25 AM on December 6, 2007 [4 favorites]
posted by uaudio at 11:25 AM on December 6, 2007 [4 favorites]
New shoes!
I'm a little amazed at the visceral reaction I still have to some of these images.
posted by elfgirl at 11:30 AM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
I'm a little amazed at the visceral reaction I still have to some of these images.
posted by elfgirl at 11:30 AM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
A golden circle of appetite and fulfillment.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:33 AM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:33 AM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
Mulholland Drive is the best thing he's ever done
could not disagree more. It was spectacular until the "lynch has done this on every project since Fire Walk With Me" mystical ending with the nonsense twists that reveal nothing and sort of invalidate the rest of the movie. The movie was supposed to be a tv show, it had no ending as a script originally because it was supposed to be a long running twin peaks style of mystery series and the movie script was the first two episodes. When the series never got picked up he decided to make a movie out of it and just tacked on that "what's in the box?!" craziness to the end of the episode scripts. and you know what? that's exactly what it feels like when you watch it.
but twin peaks was awesome anyway. and these photographs are amazing.
posted by shmegegge at 11:33 AM on December 6, 2007 [2 favorites]
could not disagree more. It was spectacular until the "lynch has done this on every project since Fire Walk With Me" mystical ending with the nonsense twists that reveal nothing and sort of invalidate the rest of the movie. The movie was supposed to be a tv show, it had no ending as a script originally because it was supposed to be a long running twin peaks style of mystery series and the movie script was the first two episodes. When the series never got picked up he decided to make a movie out of it and just tacked on that "what's in the box?!" craziness to the end of the episode scripts. and you know what? that's exactly what it feels like when you watch it.
but twin peaks was awesome anyway. and these photographs are amazing.
posted by shmegegge at 11:33 AM on December 6, 2007 [2 favorites]
I have a request:
Let's PLEASE not get into the whole back-and-forth about season 2's crappiness. I can't take it anymore. Let's just talk about the pretty pictures pleasekthx?
posted by ORthey at 11:34 AM on December 6, 2007
Let's PLEASE not get into the whole back-and-forth about season 2's crappiness. I can't take it anymore. Let's just talk about the pretty pictures pleasekthx?
posted by ORthey at 11:34 AM on December 6, 2007
xmutex, the second season really only had about five or six bad episodes, really. the ones where lynch really didn't have anything to do with it. i really loved how the show ended... these pictures are good.
posted by nonreflectiveobject at 11:35 AM on December 6, 2007
posted by nonreflectiveobject at 11:35 AM on December 6, 2007
My opinion of Richard Beymer has forever changed. No longer is he the teen-angst Jet of West Side Story or the soap-opera ham of Twin Peaks. He's a damn good photographer!
posted by infinitewindow at 11:35 AM on December 6, 2007
posted by infinitewindow at 11:35 AM on December 6, 2007
Let's PLEASE not get into the whole back-and-forth about season 2's crappiness.
Are there defenders of season 2?
posted by xmutex at 11:36 AM on December 6, 2007
Are there defenders of season 2?
posted by xmutex at 11:36 AM on December 6, 2007
Are there defenders of season 2?
Yes. Very sneaky, xmutex.
posted by ORthey at 11:38 AM on December 6, 2007
Yes. Very sneaky, xmutex.
posted by ORthey at 11:38 AM on December 6, 2007
!kcoR s'teL
posted by Scoo at 11:40 AM on December 6, 2007 [2 favorites]
posted by Scoo at 11:40 AM on December 6, 2007 [2 favorites]
sweet
posted by rooftop secrets at 11:44 AM on December 6, 2007
posted by rooftop secrets at 11:44 AM on December 6, 2007
Let's PLEASE not get into the whole back-and-forth about season 2's crappiness.
Are there defenders of season 2?
it is happening again
posted by TrialByMedia at 11:48 AM on December 6, 2007 [8 favorites]
Are there defenders of season 2?
it is happening again
posted by TrialByMedia at 11:48 AM on December 6, 2007 [8 favorites]
It was spectacular until the "lynch has done this on every project since Fire Walk With Me" mystical ending with the nonsense twists that reveal nothing and sort of invalidate the rest of the movie.
I take this to mean that you just don't like David Lynch movies.
posted by goethean at 11:50 AM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
I take this to mean that you just don't like David Lynch movies.
posted by goethean at 11:50 AM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
These are great. Lynch looks so much younger in them.
And while it's true that TP really dropped off in quality during the 2nd half of season 2, it returned to form for the last couple of eps. with Lynch himself writing and directing.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:55 AM on December 6, 2007
And while it's true that TP really dropped off in quality during the 2nd half of season 2, it returned to form for the last couple of eps. with Lynch himself writing and directing.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 11:55 AM on December 6, 2007
I take this to mean that you just don't like David Lynch movies.
Not at all. Blue Velvet is one of my favorites, and I love Wild at Heart, Eraserhead, even Dune and that Disney one about the guy riding a tractor across the country. I even liked Lost Highway until I realized how many times he's dropped the same crappy ending onto his movies.
posted by shmegegge at 12:00 PM on December 6, 2007
Not at all. Blue Velvet is one of my favorites, and I love Wild at Heart, Eraserhead, even Dune and that Disney one about the guy riding a tractor across the country. I even liked Lost Highway until I realized how many times he's dropped the same crappy ending onto his movies.
posted by shmegegge at 12:00 PM on December 6, 2007
Great pics - shame there's none of Audrey though!
posted by kenchie at 12:05 PM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
posted by kenchie at 12:05 PM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
My sister used to drive me crazy by saying "How's Annie?" over and over and over.
(In fact, if she reads this thread, she'll probably start again.)
posted by Lucinda at 12:16 PM on December 6, 2007
(In fact, if she reads this thread, she'll probably start again.)
posted by Lucinda at 12:16 PM on December 6, 2007
I actually think that Mullholland Drive is one of Lynch's most complete movies, and I say that as someone who shares shmegegge's general frustration with Lynch's endings (or lack of them). Plot-wise it didn't necessarily all tie together, but I thought that thematically he'd resolved an awful lot by the time the credits rolled, TV pilot or not.
Nice post, thanks!
posted by whir at 12:20 PM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
Nice post, thanks!
posted by whir at 12:20 PM on December 6, 2007 [1 favorite]
I'm a little amazed at the visceral reaction I still have to some of these images.
Same here. It's been years since I've had a Bob-based nightmare, but I won't be surprised if he's lurking at the end of my bed tonight!
Re: the quality or otherwise of his more recent work, I find that if you watch any of the films often enough, they turn out to be fucking amazing, flaws and all. (That said, I absolutely loved Inland Empire on first viewing, so maybe my Lynch-standards are just set a bit low.)
posted by jack_mo at 12:28 PM on December 6, 2007
Same here. It's been years since I've had a Bob-based nightmare, but I won't be surprised if he's lurking at the end of my bed tonight!
Re: the quality or otherwise of his more recent work, I find that if you watch any of the films often enough, they turn out to be fucking amazing, flaws and all. (That said, I absolutely loved Inland Empire on first viewing, so maybe my Lynch-standards are just set a bit low.)
posted by jack_mo at 12:28 PM on December 6, 2007
I love all these photos and every episode of Twin Peaks, even Season Two and a piece of pie, if you please!
When it first came out, not so much. Sitting down and watching them all in order over the course of a weekend now that I'm a little more symbol savvy -- amazing.
Thanks for posting that. Those are beautiful. Also makes it look like it was as fun to shoot, which I wouldn't have imagined.
Now if I can only find my, "I killed Laura Palmer" shirt from high school again...
posted by Gucky at 12:29 PM on December 6, 2007
When it first came out, not so much. Sitting down and watching them all in order over the course of a weekend now that I'm a little more symbol savvy -- amazing.
Thanks for posting that. Those are beautiful. Also makes it look like it was as fun to shoot, which I wouldn't have imagined.
Now if I can only find my, "I killed Laura Palmer" shirt from high school again...
posted by Gucky at 12:29 PM on December 6, 2007
I love me some Twin Peaks, but there were parts of Season 2 that were just bad. Especially the one Diane Keaton directed. Oh man, you don't need to superimpose stuff over other stuff all the time.
Topic: those photos are awesome.
posted by SoftRain at 12:39 PM on December 6, 2007
Topic: those photos are awesome.
posted by SoftRain at 12:39 PM on December 6, 2007
One day, probably in the very distant future, people will actually comprehend what a distasteful, misogynistic hack David Lynch is. Until then, I'll have to put up with people telling me what wonderful perfume arises from his shit.
posted by lodurr at 12:43 PM on December 6, 2007
posted by lodurr at 12:43 PM on December 6, 2007
One day, probably in the very distant future, people will actually comprehend what a distasteful, misogynistic hack [your favorite artist] is.
Also, if there's one thing Lynch ISN'T, it's a hack.
posted by ORthey at 1:12 PM on December 6, 2007
Also, if there's one thing Lynch ISN'T, it's a hack.
posted by ORthey at 1:12 PM on December 6, 2007
(is anyone else unable to view these? I default to a screen saying I need safari 2 or firefox 1.5 and higher to view. Aaand I'm running safari 3 and firefox 2.)
posted by minervous at 1:24 PM on December 6, 2007
posted by minervous at 1:24 PM on December 6, 2007
Lynch's fear of sex might invite a very weirdly-shaped and strained argument about 'misogyny' (although it would have to also apply to a majority of works of art ever created) but yeah, the word 'hack' wouldn't survive the stretching required to incorporate him. 'Distasteful'? Sure, okay. Sometimes. (It's actually to our culture's detriment we don't have a bigger seat at the table for the grotesque.) He can also be astonishingly, gaspingly sublime.
I think INLAND EMPIRE might be the beginning of an even higher ascendency in his work.
posted by broodle at 1:34 PM on December 6, 2007
I think INLAND EMPIRE might be the beginning of an even higher ascendency in his work.
posted by broodle at 1:34 PM on December 6, 2007
It was spectacular until the "lynch has done this on every project since Fire Walk With Me" mystical ending with the nonsense twists that reveal nothing and sort of invalidate the rest of the movie.
I know exactly what you are saying, and you are right. And I still thought Inland Empire was a masterpiece.
The way I see it, there are two ways to make movies. One way is the Stanley Kubrick approach, where every single prop, color choice, and word of dialogue have meaning. I'm thinking here of Kubrick's choice to make the monolith in 2001 the same aspect ration as a movie screen so that the totally black shots with the creepy opera music are actually closeup shots of the monolith, which you don't realize until your fifth drop of acid during your 19th viewing of the film. See also, "Eyes Wide Shut" in which Kubrick built an entire city intersection and meticulously chose the color and words on every piece of signage to convey additional hidden meaning -"Rainbow" costume shop harkens back to the party at the start of the film where the two girls invite Cruise to go with them to the "end of the rainbow" or when Cruise is stalked by the creepy guy on the street after the orgy scene, one of the shops he passes buy is the "Verona" something or other, Verona being a city in Veneto which also contains Venice, whose carnival festivals in the middle ages gave birth to the kinds of creepy costumes shown during that orgy scene. Etc etc. It even works across Kubrick films (Beethoven in Clockwork (Ludwigo treatment), Beethoven in EWS, etc.).
So that's one approach. Very careful, very thoughful. Film as text where everything illuminated the layers and layers in the film.
The other approach is to shoot a movie like de Kooning or Kandinsky paint. Random images depicted only vaguely or haphazardly, with everything, the color, brushstrokes, composition contributing to a single emotional message, a mood, or a feeling. Paintings that are more gestalt works - you see the painting and you hear something (noise, jazz, traffic, etc.) but it is all in service of a single thought. There are layers to the creation of the work, but there is a single unified message.
Lynch makes films like an abstract painter (don't forget that he studied painting, not film). This is why he so completely loves digital video as a medium, its more flexible and more conducive to experimentation. Lynch thinks of a scene completely divorced from any context that he would like to make because it creates a mood and he shoots them, the way a painter would think of a great way to paint a cube that pushes the colors around in some new way. So he thinks in terms of mood, not story. Then he strings the scenes together to string the moods together. It's merely because the same actors are used across the scenes that your mind wants to construct a linear story.
His films are love stories, or more appropriately, gestalt works of art about different stages of being in love. Blue Velvet, Twin Peaks, Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive, and Inland Empire. TP is the innocence of young love, perverted by its collision with adult lust. LH is about jealousy, betrayal, and the fear of losing the one who betrayed you. You kill the thing you love (just like TP). But it is the emotional component of the love story he is filming, not the intellectual story of boy meets girl. They are stories about joy mixed with lust and poisoned by jealousy. But he conveys the joy and the lust and the jealousy not through plot or dialogue, but through pure image and sound. Lynch insists on doing his own sound design for his own films. He's not trying to make you feel happy or sexy, but rather communicate what the character is feeling.
Think about how often Lynch uses the motif of the doppelganger its corollary the switched identity. He uses it so often you can almost assume any new film he makes will have it. In TP, Lynch made the sexually abuses stripper Laura Palmer look exactly like her sweet innocent cousin Madeleine (different hair color which accentuates how overt this choice is). LH has Bill Pullman become someone else after killing his wife, only to find that in some psychotic fuge escape fantasy, he falls in love with her twin (or is it really her again). MD repeats the theme, with the jilted lover slaying her parter only to become her and nonetheless fall in love with her.
IE is the purest example, Laura Dern descends through her own loveless life, to assume the identity of the lover she portrays, which leads her to experience the tragedy of the Polish prostitute and her husband losing their son. But isn't this what love is? What is making love other than the desire to unite or become the person you love?
Think of your own life, have you ever loved someone who also sometimes made you jealous, or hurt you? Did you ever find yourself long after the fact think about those hurt feelings, or re-experience that jealousy at the most inappropriate time, such as during sex? This thing you love has hurt you so you sooth the ache by embracing it tighter.
Lynch is very much in tune with pushing these feelings into you by bypassing your reason. Inland Empire is brilliant in how he pushes scene after scene at you to disturb and unsettle you, right after he made you comfortable. It is like having a nice afternoon picnic with your lover, and you suddenly remember (how you caught her at a party last year slow dancing with some other guy (which she said meant nothing (despite the fact that it's obvious the guys is better looking/richer/more experienced than you (who you now feel inferior to (opening the wound again))))) and she smiles at you and says "It's such a nice day isn't it?"
That's not something you can convey linearly with plot and dialogue. So he'd give you no discernible story that you'd cling to for safety in that storm. Instead, he sails you into the storm and throws you off the boat.
He could give you some syrupy dialogue about how "You complete me", but instead, in Inland Empire, he gives you a quick cut over brown noise to Laura Dern walking up to you out of focus on a dark path, only at the last minute you realize she isn't walking, she's running at breakneck speed in slow motion, and at the last moment, as she bears down on the camera, you see that she is screaming.
She lost herself in the love story she's acting in because her relationship with her husband is antiseptic and procedural. This is a source of anger. How can you deny me love if you really love me? Or do you merely control me? Her relationship with her husband is so bereft of love that it is simpler for her to become the impassioned lover of the film she stars in and replace reality with that fantasy. Her mind will reconstruct her world to allow her to be in love rather than let her keep her sanity without it. But she can't reestablish her true self until she is totally devastated.
Love is overwhelming need and vulnerability and anxiety. Lynch is trying to get that message across time and time again. You hate your lover because you need them so much that it terrifies you and that fear can turn to madness or rage. That's the summary of almost every great work of literature. Love is turmoil, hate and love of the same person that you hold at once in your heart, and that passion resolves itself one way or another - you and your lover develop your own separate identities within the relationship, or the relationship ends and both are broken. Lynch recognizes this as inherently irrational, and yet it is a universal experience of every member of our species. Why does one person make you feel so wonderfully and frighteningly out of control, sometimes even before you've spoken to them? Isn't that madness?
So Lynch shows this to you. He recreates the madness, the emotions, with sound and image, noise and shattered darkness, so that you empathize with the plight of the lover in his film. The endings only seem fantastic, the way you look back on your mindset during a frenzied love affair only to shake your head and wonder "What was I thinking?"
You can't deconstruct a David Lynch film the way you would a Kubrick film. Doing that is like looking for Christian and papal symbolism in a Pollock drip painting instead of in a Michelangelo. You watch a David Lynch film to be reminded that love is terrifying and beautiful and worth sacrificing everything in the world. The way you would stare at Munch's "The Scream", and contemplate it is how you should watch a David Lynch film.
Why is this person screaming? Am I screaming?
posted by Pastabagel at 1:36 PM on December 6, 2007 [41 favorites]
I know exactly what you are saying, and you are right. And I still thought Inland Empire was a masterpiece.
The way I see it, there are two ways to make movies. One way is the Stanley Kubrick approach, where every single prop, color choice, and word of dialogue have meaning. I'm thinking here of Kubrick's choice to make the monolith in 2001 the same aspect ration as a movie screen so that the totally black shots with the creepy opera music are actually closeup shots of the monolith, which you don't realize until your fifth drop of acid during your 19th viewing of the film. See also, "Eyes Wide Shut" in which Kubrick built an entire city intersection and meticulously chose the color and words on every piece of signage to convey additional hidden meaning -"Rainbow" costume shop harkens back to the party at the start of the film where the two girls invite Cruise to go with them to the "end of the rainbow" or when Cruise is stalked by the creepy guy on the street after the orgy scene, one of the shops he passes buy is the "Verona" something or other, Verona being a city in Veneto which also contains Venice, whose carnival festivals in the middle ages gave birth to the kinds of creepy costumes shown during that orgy scene. Etc etc. It even works across Kubrick films (Beethoven in Clockwork (Ludwigo treatment), Beethoven in EWS, etc.).
So that's one approach. Very careful, very thoughful. Film as text where everything illuminated the layers and layers in the film.
The other approach is to shoot a movie like de Kooning or Kandinsky paint. Random images depicted only vaguely or haphazardly, with everything, the color, brushstrokes, composition contributing to a single emotional message, a mood, or a feeling. Paintings that are more gestalt works - you see the painting and you hear something (noise, jazz, traffic, etc.) but it is all in service of a single thought. There are layers to the creation of the work, but there is a single unified message.
Lynch makes films like an abstract painter (don't forget that he studied painting, not film). This is why he so completely loves digital video as a medium, its more flexible and more conducive to experimentation. Lynch thinks of a scene completely divorced from any context that he would like to make because it creates a mood and he shoots them, the way a painter would think of a great way to paint a cube that pushes the colors around in some new way. So he thinks in terms of mood, not story. Then he strings the scenes together to string the moods together. It's merely because the same actors are used across the scenes that your mind wants to construct a linear story.
His films are love stories, or more appropriately, gestalt works of art about different stages of being in love. Blue Velvet, Twin Peaks, Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive, and Inland Empire. TP is the innocence of young love, perverted by its collision with adult lust. LH is about jealousy, betrayal, and the fear of losing the one who betrayed you. You kill the thing you love (just like TP). But it is the emotional component of the love story he is filming, not the intellectual story of boy meets girl. They are stories about joy mixed with lust and poisoned by jealousy. But he conveys the joy and the lust and the jealousy not through plot or dialogue, but through pure image and sound. Lynch insists on doing his own sound design for his own films. He's not trying to make you feel happy or sexy, but rather communicate what the character is feeling.
Think about how often Lynch uses the motif of the doppelganger its corollary the switched identity. He uses it so often you can almost assume any new film he makes will have it. In TP, Lynch made the sexually abuses stripper Laura Palmer look exactly like her sweet innocent cousin Madeleine (different hair color which accentuates how overt this choice is). LH has Bill Pullman become someone else after killing his wife, only to find that in some psychotic fuge escape fantasy, he falls in love with her twin (or is it really her again). MD repeats the theme, with the jilted lover slaying her parter only to become her and nonetheless fall in love with her.
IE is the purest example, Laura Dern descends through her own loveless life, to assume the identity of the lover she portrays, which leads her to experience the tragedy of the Polish prostitute and her husband losing their son. But isn't this what love is? What is making love other than the desire to unite or become the person you love?
Think of your own life, have you ever loved someone who also sometimes made you jealous, or hurt you? Did you ever find yourself long after the fact think about those hurt feelings, or re-experience that jealousy at the most inappropriate time, such as during sex? This thing you love has hurt you so you sooth the ache by embracing it tighter.
Lynch is very much in tune with pushing these feelings into you by bypassing your reason. Inland Empire is brilliant in how he pushes scene after scene at you to disturb and unsettle you, right after he made you comfortable. It is like having a nice afternoon picnic with your lover, and you suddenly remember (how you caught her at a party last year slow dancing with some other guy (which she said meant nothing (despite the fact that it's obvious the guys is better looking/richer/more experienced than you (who you now feel inferior to (opening the wound again))))) and she smiles at you and says "It's such a nice day isn't it?"
That's not something you can convey linearly with plot and dialogue. So he'd give you no discernible story that you'd cling to for safety in that storm. Instead, he sails you into the storm and throws you off the boat.
He could give you some syrupy dialogue about how "You complete me", but instead, in Inland Empire, he gives you a quick cut over brown noise to Laura Dern walking up to you out of focus on a dark path, only at the last minute you realize she isn't walking, she's running at breakneck speed in slow motion, and at the last moment, as she bears down on the camera, you see that she is screaming.
She lost herself in the love story she's acting in because her relationship with her husband is antiseptic and procedural. This is a source of anger. How can you deny me love if you really love me? Or do you merely control me? Her relationship with her husband is so bereft of love that it is simpler for her to become the impassioned lover of the film she stars in and replace reality with that fantasy. Her mind will reconstruct her world to allow her to be in love rather than let her keep her sanity without it. But she can't reestablish her true self until she is totally devastated.
Love is overwhelming need and vulnerability and anxiety. Lynch is trying to get that message across time and time again. You hate your lover because you need them so much that it terrifies you and that fear can turn to madness or rage. That's the summary of almost every great work of literature. Love is turmoil, hate and love of the same person that you hold at once in your heart, and that passion resolves itself one way or another - you and your lover develop your own separate identities within the relationship, or the relationship ends and both are broken. Lynch recognizes this as inherently irrational, and yet it is a universal experience of every member of our species. Why does one person make you feel so wonderfully and frighteningly out of control, sometimes even before you've spoken to them? Isn't that madness?
So Lynch shows this to you. He recreates the madness, the emotions, with sound and image, noise and shattered darkness, so that you empathize with the plight of the lover in his film. The endings only seem fantastic, the way you look back on your mindset during a frenzied love affair only to shake your head and wonder "What was I thinking?"
You can't deconstruct a David Lynch film the way you would a Kubrick film. Doing that is like looking for Christian and papal symbolism in a Pollock drip painting instead of in a Michelangelo. You watch a David Lynch film to be reminded that love is terrifying and beautiful and worth sacrificing everything in the world. The way you would stare at Munch's "The Scream", and contemplate it is how you should watch a David Lynch film.
Why is this person screaming? Am I screaming?
posted by Pastabagel at 1:36 PM on December 6, 2007 [41 favorites]
Mulholland Drive just aired on channel 9 -- local broadcast channel. I taped it to see how they dealt with the, um, stuff that isn't FCC-friendly.
Anyone get the Twin Peaks box set? I thought they did a pretty good job with the extras...
posted by armacy at 1:37 PM on December 6, 2007
Anyone get the Twin Peaks box set? I thought they did a pretty good job with the extras...
posted by armacy at 1:37 PM on December 6, 2007
"Harry, I'm going to let you in on a little secret. Every day, once a day, give yourself a present. Don't plan it. Don't wait for it. Just let it happen. It could be a new shirt at the men's store, a catnap in your office chair, or two cups of good, hot black coffee."
OR a set of photos like this. Thank you!
armacy: I have the Gold Box set and I agree with you.
posted by chihiro at 1:58 PM on December 6, 2007
OR a set of photos like this. Thank you!
armacy: I have the Gold Box set and I agree with you.
posted by chihiro at 1:58 PM on December 6, 2007
This just makes me want the four-hour version of Fire Walk With Me. And a side of a non-crappy Region 1 release of Lost Highway, please.
posted by adipocere at 1:58 PM on December 6, 2007
posted by adipocere at 1:58 PM on December 6, 2007
... a very weirdly-shaped and strained argument about 'misogyny' ...
So, let me get this straight: You acknowledge that "fear of sex" is a major driver in his work, and you think that arguments about misogyny that were based on that would have to be "weirdly-shaped and strained"?
As for the "hack" counter, elsewhere: "Hack" is a word with a rich array of connotations. Lynch fits the bill on a number of those.
And on that note, I bow out, since on the matter of Lynch and several other artists (Adrian Lyne and Lars von Trier among them), I generally feel the less oxygen pumped into discussions about them, the better.
posted by lodurr at 2:21 PM on December 6, 2007
So, let me get this straight: You acknowledge that "fear of sex" is a major driver in his work, and you think that arguments about misogyny that were based on that would have to be "weirdly-shaped and strained"?
As for the "hack" counter, elsewhere: "Hack" is a word with a rich array of connotations. Lynch fits the bill on a number of those.
And on that note, I bow out, since on the matter of Lynch and several other artists (Adrian Lyne and Lars von Trier among them), I generally feel the less oxygen pumped into discussions about them, the better.
posted by lodurr at 2:21 PM on December 6, 2007
One dim day in Chicago, many years ago, my boyfriend came back from a trip to visit his family carrying four or five taped-from-TV episodes of some show a friend of his had begged him to watch. ("Even if you don't like it, you have to admit it's interesting! David Lynch did it!")
I was home sick and he had the day off for some other reason, so we popped them in the VCR for a marathon session. We spent the whole day watching them, rapt. After that we were hooked for the duration.
It's the only time in my entire life I've watched TV on a regular basis.
(Incidentally, while I'm reminiscing about the early 90s, do any of you remember VCR rewinders? Some of which were shaped like cars?)
Thanks for the pictures, Prospero.
posted by tangerine at 2:27 PM on December 6, 2007
I was home sick and he had the day off for some other reason, so we popped them in the VCR for a marathon session. We spent the whole day watching them, rapt. After that we were hooked for the duration.
It's the only time in my entire life I've watched TV on a regular basis.
(Incidentally, while I'm reminiscing about the early 90s, do any of you remember VCR rewinders? Some of which were shaped like cars?)
Thanks for the pictures, Prospero.
posted by tangerine at 2:27 PM on December 6, 2007
It's not a popular choice, but my favorite movie of all time is Lost Highway. I get something new out of it every time I watch it. And the soundtrack is top notch as well.
posted by slimepuppy at 2:34 PM on December 6, 2007
posted by slimepuppy at 2:34 PM on December 6, 2007
Funny that people should mention season 2 ...
As it turns out, I'm from the Pacific Northwest, and before moving away, I worked in film and video production.
A lot of friends of mine worked on TP (while I was working other gigs in Puget Sound), and everyone in the production community knew the scoop on Season 2: There never was going to be a Season 2.
Lynch and his production partner for this, Frost, never planned beyond the first season. My understanding was, midway through Season 1 they were assuming that the show was too weird to exist on TV, and they had not planned beyond the first season (initially, they were planning on it getting yanked half way through).
They were planning on leaving everything unresolved (the main driver, of who killed Laura would never be revealed).
A friend of mine was in the production office towards the end of production on Season 1, and Lynch was on the phone with the network. He hung up the phone, turned to Frost and said, "Bad news Mark."
"What, we've finally been axed?"
"No. Even worse, we've been extended into a second season."
"Second season!? We don't have a second season! There are no plans for a second season!"
"I know, I know ... don't worry, we'll think of something."
So, as I gathered, the bulk of the second season was just thrown together (especially all the chess deal stuff and the Cooper/Windom Earle relationship).
It was literally like something from The Producers, but it kept some of my friends solvent for another while, so am I to complain.
posted by Relay at 2:38 PM on December 6, 2007 [14 favorites]
As it turns out, I'm from the Pacific Northwest, and before moving away, I worked in film and video production.
A lot of friends of mine worked on TP (while I was working other gigs in Puget Sound), and everyone in the production community knew the scoop on Season 2: There never was going to be a Season 2.
Lynch and his production partner for this, Frost, never planned beyond the first season. My understanding was, midway through Season 1 they were assuming that the show was too weird to exist on TV, and they had not planned beyond the first season (initially, they were planning on it getting yanked half way through).
They were planning on leaving everything unresolved (the main driver, of who killed Laura would never be revealed).
A friend of mine was in the production office towards the end of production on Season 1, and Lynch was on the phone with the network. He hung up the phone, turned to Frost and said, "Bad news Mark."
"What, we've finally been axed?"
"No. Even worse, we've been extended into a second season."
"Second season!? We don't have a second season! There are no plans for a second season!"
"I know, I know ... don't worry, we'll think of something."
So, as I gathered, the bulk of the second season was just thrown together (especially all the chess deal stuff and the Cooper/Windom Earle relationship).
It was literally like something from The Producers, but it kept some of my friends solvent for another while, so am I to complain.
posted by Relay at 2:38 PM on December 6, 2007 [14 favorites]
well, Pastabagel made a very strong argument. I haven't seen Inland Empire, yet, btw. I suppose I'll put it on my netflix. I, at this moment, maintain the notion that his endings seem to be rehashed from older movies, but I'm at least way more willing to give them a second viewing now.
posted by shmegegge at 2:42 PM on December 6, 2007
posted by shmegegge at 2:42 PM on December 6, 2007
tangerine: I remember those rewinders very well. The video store where I worked around that time even sold them. So much better to pop your tape in a car to rewind at home than to endure the ignominy of paying the 50 cent fee upon return.
posted by chihiro at 2:42 PM on December 6, 2007
posted by chihiro at 2:42 PM on December 6, 2007
relay just made the greatest comment in metafilter history. I sincerely hope it's actual fact and not smoke being blown up my ass.
posted by shmegegge at 2:45 PM on December 6, 2007
posted by shmegegge at 2:45 PM on December 6, 2007
No, so far as I remember, that's how it went down shmegegge.
Yeah, I heard this from another production guy, and we can be off on occasion, but I also heard more or less the same thing (i.e. Frost/Lynch getting a 2nd season foisted on them) from multiple other sources at the time (grips, gaffers, guys at post houses, etc.).
It was a fun show, and I enjoyed it at the time (and still like it), and yeah, the second season bogged in places, but just the fact that a show that odd made it onto television is a big mitigating factor.
posted by Relay at 3:06 PM on December 6, 2007
Yeah, I heard this from another production guy, and we can be off on occasion, but I also heard more or less the same thing (i.e. Frost/Lynch getting a 2nd season foisted on them) from multiple other sources at the time (grips, gaffers, guys at post houses, etc.).
It was a fun show, and I enjoyed it at the time (and still like it), and yeah, the second season bogged in places, but just the fact that a show that odd made it onto television is a big mitigating factor.
posted by Relay at 3:06 PM on December 6, 2007
I feel a bit dizzy. mucho thanks for the college flashbacks!
posted by killy willy at 3:22 PM on December 6, 2007
posted by killy willy at 3:22 PM on December 6, 2007
lodurr: "So, let me get this straight: You acknowledge that "fear of sex" is a major driver in his work, and you think that arguments about misogyny that were based on that would have to be "weirdly-shaped and strained"?"
Yes. Lynch is a sexual being made uncomfortable by his own sexuality. I don't know if you've been to America, but that's a fairly ubiquitous feeling here, certainly not unique to gender.
Even more than calling his work 'shit', however, that you can mention him and Adrian Lyne in the same post establishes the regard you hold for him, so I accept we have reached an insurmountable impasse on the subject.
posted by broodle at 3:37 PM on December 6, 2007
Yes. Lynch is a sexual being made uncomfortable by his own sexuality. I don't know if you've been to America, but that's a fairly ubiquitous feeling here, certainly not unique to gender.
Even more than calling his work 'shit', however, that you can mention him and Adrian Lyne in the same post establishes the regard you hold for him, so I accept we have reached an insurmountable impasse on the subject.
posted by broodle at 3:37 PM on December 6, 2007
(is anyone else unable to view these? I default to a screen saying I need safari 2 or firefox 1.5 and higher to view. Aaand I'm running safari 3 and firefox 2.)
Yeah, same thing's happening to me and I'm on Firefox 2- and I'd really love to see these. Grrrr.
posted by Dormant Gorilla at 4:44 PM on December 6, 2007
God damn, pastabagel. You just articulated most of my thoughts about Lynch and then some.
I'm saving your comment to show to anyone who ever asks why Lynch rocks my world. (And people do, you know.) I always have trouble articulating what his movies do to me because they're kind of primal, or pre-conscious, or whatever you want to call it- the fact is I do respond to them, and now your explanation gives me words to explain why.
posted by BoringPostcards at 6:54 PM on December 6, 2007
I'm saving your comment to show to anyone who ever asks why Lynch rocks my world. (And people do, you know.) I always have trouble articulating what his movies do to me because they're kind of primal, or pre-conscious, or whatever you want to call it- the fact is I do respond to them, and now your explanation gives me words to explain why.
posted by BoringPostcards at 6:54 PM on December 6, 2007
Man, perfect timing. I just picked up the gold boxed set and had episodes playing in my apartment all weekend.
But I wish the universe had given me a "SPOILER WARNING: Hey Cadge, maybe you shouldn't open this link alone in your apartment at night, given that Killer Bob and pals still freak you the hell out."
posted by cadge at 8:34 PM on December 6, 2007
But I wish the universe had given me a "SPOILER WARNING: Hey Cadge, maybe you shouldn't open this link alone in your apartment at night, given that Killer Bob and pals still freak you the hell out."
posted by cadge at 8:34 PM on December 6, 2007
Gorgeous pictures. Happy sigh.
In the early '90s I was a poor-ish comp sci university student in a flat chilly city on Argentina. The only amenity in my boarding house's room was my small B/W tv set and basic cable, back then the Shangri-La of entertainment for us down there. I remember the winter night I tuned in to the first episode of TP with some curiosity and only the vaguest clue what was it about, and none whatsoever about who were the nutcases involved in doing it. I'm in my full survival gear (up to and including gloves and padded jacket), since the only kind of heating available will only defrost you mildly and then needs to be turned off or you'll risk geting CO'd to death inside your room.
Somehow those were two of the best hours of my life. I wish I could buy Mr Lynch a big cup of hot black coffee before either him or me kick the bucket.
posted by Iosephus at 11:32 PM on December 6, 2007
In the early '90s I was a poor-ish comp sci university student in a flat chilly city on Argentina. The only amenity in my boarding house's room was my small B/W tv set and basic cable, back then the Shangri-La of entertainment for us down there. I remember the winter night I tuned in to the first episode of TP with some curiosity and only the vaguest clue what was it about, and none whatsoever about who were the nutcases involved in doing it. I'm in my full survival gear (up to and including gloves and padded jacket), since the only kind of heating available will only defrost you mildly and then needs to be turned off or you'll risk geting CO'd to death inside your room.
Somehow those were two of the best hours of my life. I wish I could buy Mr Lynch a big cup of hot black coffee before either him or me kick the bucket.
posted by Iosephus at 11:32 PM on December 6, 2007
broodle: ... that you can mention him and Adrian Lyne in the same post ...
... proves that I'm aware of the identity and work of more than one film director? Because I could also mention John Ford, Sammo Hung or Leni Riefenstahl if you'd like. Oh, wait, I have -- I must think all six are equally skilled.
Certainly it in no way proves that I equate the objective, skills-judged quality of their work, if that's what you're insinuating.
Lynch is a cut above de Sade (who is a cut above Lyne in some ways), to be sure, but yes, Lynch is a remarkably skilled film maker.
Your trite dismissal does illustrate how uptight we are about sex in America. We're so uptight that some people develop some kind of compensatory response where any objection to any kind of sexually-coded behavior (like, say, glamorizing sexually-coded brutality) is written off as philistinism.
As for his 'discomfort with his own sexuality', as you so delicately put it, it does seem to me to be a little awkward to claim that it's not a misogynistic discomfort when it seems to most commonly manifest in violence toward women, both literal and symbolic.
posted by lodurr at 1:43 AM on December 7, 2007
... proves that I'm aware of the identity and work of more than one film director? Because I could also mention John Ford, Sammo Hung or Leni Riefenstahl if you'd like. Oh, wait, I have -- I must think all six are equally skilled.
Certainly it in no way proves that I equate the objective, skills-judged quality of their work, if that's what you're insinuating.
Lynch is a cut above de Sade (who is a cut above Lyne in some ways), to be sure, but yes, Lynch is a remarkably skilled film maker.
Your trite dismissal does illustrate how uptight we are about sex in America. We're so uptight that some people develop some kind of compensatory response where any objection to any kind of sexually-coded behavior (like, say, glamorizing sexually-coded brutality) is written off as philistinism.
As for his 'discomfort with his own sexuality', as you so delicately put it, it does seem to me to be a little awkward to claim that it's not a misogynistic discomfort when it seems to most commonly manifest in violence toward women, both literal and symbolic.
posted by lodurr at 1:43 AM on December 7, 2007
Muchly appreciated. And I had totally forgotten that Grace Zabriskie played Sarah Palmer (I spent a lot of Inland Empire wondering what I'd seen her in).
My own take on Lynch is that I really appreciate having seen his work after the fact when my mind can pour over the questions, images and associations he has created. During the actual process of watching, however, I wish that he'd fracking hurry up and not spend so much time on repeated long, lingering face shots of people being confused. I get it. They're confused. Me too. I am not wanting some kind of cathartic confusion here.
A good friend of mine has accused me latching on to satisfactory explanations for his narratives, but I still maintain that both Twin Peaks and Mulholland Drive are explicable and actually internally consistant. Lost Highway and Inland Empire (sorry, INLAND EMPIRE), not so much.
posted by Sparx at 3:43 AM on December 7, 2007
My own take on Lynch is that I really appreciate having seen his work after the fact when my mind can pour over the questions, images and associations he has created. During the actual process of watching, however, I wish that he'd fracking hurry up and not spend so much time on repeated long, lingering face shots of people being confused. I get it. They're confused. Me too. I am not wanting some kind of cathartic confusion here.
A good friend of mine has accused me latching on to satisfactory explanations for his narratives, but I still maintain that both Twin Peaks and Mulholland Drive are explicable and actually internally consistant. Lost Highway and Inland Empire (sorry, INLAND EMPIRE), not so much.
posted by Sparx at 3:43 AM on December 7, 2007
I am a deep admirer of Lynch's work and am very very grateful for this post!
posted by The Salaryman at 3:51 AM on December 7, 2007
posted by The Salaryman at 3:51 AM on December 7, 2007
these are the best thing i've seen on the web all year.
yeah, the second season sucked at times. but without the second season, we wouldn't get bob throwing maddy into the map of missoula, montana and that flash in the mirror of white-haired leland transposed into bob and oh god, that whole episode is one of the greatest pieces of television i've ever sat through again and again and again.
posted by humuhumu at 2:25 PM on December 7, 2007
yeah, the second season sucked at times. but without the second season, we wouldn't get bob throwing maddy into the map of missoula, montana and that flash in the mirror of white-haired leland transposed into bob and oh god, that whole episode is one of the greatest pieces of television i've ever sat through again and again and again.
posted by humuhumu at 2:25 PM on December 7, 2007
Of possible interest: one of the Onion AV Club's critics has just started a project where he watches and blogs about the entire run of Twin Peaks. They're at episode 2 right now.
posted by whir at 5:01 PM on December 7, 2007
posted by whir at 5:01 PM on December 7, 2007
A friend let me know you were talking here about Richard Beymer's wonderful photos of the last days of filming on Twin Peaks. I first saw them (apparently they've been around for years) when I rewatched the whole series several weeks ago via the new Gold Box edition.
It's my understanding he will be offering them for sale again, hopefully soon, and you can keep abreast of any news at his MySpace
There are photos of some of his art work there, but more so here at FLICKR
Richard also has a novel out on Amazon.com called Impostor: Or whatever happened to Richard Beymer? - there's a link to the listing at his MySpace.
posted by Tonya J at 9:52 AM on December 8, 2007
It's my understanding he will be offering them for sale again, hopefully soon, and you can keep abreast of any news at his MySpace
There are photos of some of his art work there, but more so here at FLICKR
Richard also has a novel out on Amazon.com called Impostor: Or whatever happened to Richard Beymer? - there's a link to the listing at his MySpace.
posted by Tonya J at 9:52 AM on December 8, 2007
« Older Nicole Carroll doing bodyweight x15 in the... | You know you hate them, or love them Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
Awesome photos.
posted by xmutex at 11:09 AM on December 6, 2007