Acclaimed filmmaker David Lynch passed away aged 78 on January 15. The news devastated fans everywhere and the wider film community, with friend and long-time collaborator Kyle MacLachlan writing that his world is, “that much fuller because I knew him”, but, “that much emptier now that he’s gone”.
I became a Lynch fan during the first Covid lockdown, aged 15. I had just finished watching Gravity Falls fully for the first time and upon some google searches discovered it was inspired by a cult 90s show. A show that would change my perception of film & TV for good, that show was the legendary Twin Peaks.
In just two seasons, Mark Frost and Lynch revolutionised television with their idiosyncratic small-town drama, which combined elements of traditional soap operas, murder mysteries and detective series with a dose of Lynchian surrealism. I can’t say 15 year old me fully comprehended the show, not on my first watch through or even my fifth, or sixth… and I can’t say that 20-year-old me is any the wiser either. Twin Peaks feels like something familiar, but at the same time, like some bizarre alternate dimension you can’t help but get sucked into.
Blue Velvet
From Twin Peaks, I delved into the wider world of Lynch. Blue Velvet is his first non- Peaks work I remember watching and I found it just as captivating. Lynch had a knack for delving into the darkness hidden beneath daily life, but also for finding the beauty where others wouldn’t. Blue Velvet opens, as an example, with a seemingly ordinary small town with Roses and white picket fences but also revealed to us are the critters hiding just below the surface. Despite its overall darkness, Velvet is neither nightmare, nor dream, it operates on its own level of consciousness.
This Magic Moment
Another element of Lynch’s work which has always captivated me is his use of music.
In Twin Peaks season 2, episode 2, our teenage characters are having a sing-along to Just You, a soppy 50s- throwback moment, however, about a minute later we are met with one of the most disturbing moments in tv history as Killer Bob crawls over the living room couch, as if trying to break through the barrier of our screens. While the song is odd and slightly off-kilter anyway, it’s the instant tonal shift that allows the frightening moment to truly get under the skin. It’s an image that terrified me as a 15-year-old, and I still can’t get it out of my mind when I reach the moment during rewatches.
In Blue Velvet, perhaps the most well-known scene is the one where Ben, played by the late Dean Stockwell, “sings” Roy Orbison’s In Dreams. For the scenes it’s simply bizarre and one of the most surreal moments in the entire film, this is the place where Frank Booth (Dennis Hopper’s F-bomb loving, sadistic gangster) is keeping nightclub singer Dorothy Vallens (Isabella Rossellini) husband and son hostage, yet Frank wants to watch a musical performance… throughout the film sweet, nostalgic 50s numbers and throwbacks are juxtaposed with the dark side of the suburban landscape and this haunting scene also marks the “no going back” point for Kyle MacLachlan’s naive Jeffrey.
Other memorable musical scenes in Lynch’ work are in Lost Highway when Patricia Arquette steps out the car in slow-motion as Lou Reed’s cover of This Magic Moment plays, any of the roadhouse performances in Twin Peaks: The Return — where he featured some of his favourite modern musicians or the absolutely crazy Locomotion scene in Inland Empire.
A wonderful and strange team
Lynch also knew what actors to work with and regulars like Naomi Watts, Jack Nance, Kyle MacLachlan and Laura Dern fit right into Lynch’s strange and unusual world. Even smaller roles, like the aforementioned Ben in Blue Velvet, the dancing girl on the car in that same film or the I’ve Told Every Little Star girl in Muholland Drive leave a lasting impression, A personal favourite is in Twin Peaks: The Return where Sheriff Bobby talks to a woman, stuck in traffic outside the RR Diner, who has to get her sick child to the hospital. The kid then wakes, zombie- like ,as the woman lets out a gloriously hammy scream. It demonstrates Lynch’s sense of humour perfectly and the viewer is left not knowing how to feel: is this terrifying, hilarious, both?
Lynch’s style is so unique that attempts to recreate it never come close. I enjoyed 2019’s Greener Grass, which is undoubtedly absurd comedy, but feels more like a weird cut SNL sketch than something ‘Lynchian’ as people described it. Lynch wasn’t trying to be quirky, he just was. His oddness is just so natural. Take even Twin Peaks second season’s middle episodes, where without as much input from Lynch, the team introduced increasingly annoying and trite subplots in their attempts to emulate Lynch, coming to the most WTF, infamous climaxes in TV history where Josie Packard becomes a doorknob… even for Twin Peaks weird world, it’s just too much.
David Lynch will be deeply missed by the industry and fans but he leaves an ever-lasting impact on filmmakers and their dreams. The world will never be as wonderful and strange as it once was.
Featured Image Credit: Netflix
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Arts Editor 24/25
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