tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post1795275982952209738..comments2023-09-08T14:41:38.903+01:00Comments on faces on posters<br> too many choices: Daydream Nation: Back To The Velvetcarlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17886258675618058752noreply@blogger.comBlogger18125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-90556740019380604752011-03-17T22:41:54.646+00:002011-03-17T22:41:54.646+00:00I can barely remember the sequels, apart from the ...I can barely remember the sequels, apart from the migraine inducing product-placement in "2" (something Lynch isn't averse to, either).<br /><br />I remember Crispin Glover's interviews. It was Wossy's attempt at a smirking 'freakshow' segment, like his role model David Letterman. Glover directed his own films - bizarre ritualistic pieces featuring visibly ('cinematically') disabled people in circus outfits, dwarves and Feral House publisher Adam Parfrey in blackface carrying out executions. Basically David Lynch without pastiche (or 'irony') to hide behind.<br /><br />Good point point about Bedford Falls. Am I alone in thinking that if Mr. Smith really did take over Washington, he'd be a Lindbergh-style fascist demagogue; with his small-town boy scout camps, pseudo-rebeliousness and ranting sincerity?David K Waynehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10756535951359716522noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-35117977739157560312011-03-17T20:16:33.718+00:002011-03-17T20:16:33.718+00:00I remember Crispin Glover mainly from the TV inter...I remember Crispin Glover mainly from the TV interviews he used to do in the '80's. He was a favourite guest of Jonathan Ross (another neoliberal progenitor). Glover used to bring strange things onto Ross's show, like a matchbox with a dead cockroach in it, and claim that he "collected" them. He seemed to be an "act" in real life, rather like Emo Phillips.<br /><br />The whole BTTF scenario seems to invoke the scenario of It's A Wonderful life, with the idea of the town of Bedford Falls going to seed if George Bailey commits suicide. The ultra-acerbic American social critic Jim Kunstler points out that regardless of the outcome of that film, Bedford Falls, if it really existed, would now be a soul-less, centreless vista of parking lots surrounded by Walmarts, strip-malls and six-lane highways, because that's what the American people really want.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-51698125630038164982011-03-17T18:17:13.847+00:002011-03-17T18:17:13.847+00:00Wonderful piece.
Crispin Glover is definitely a t...Wonderful piece.<br /><br />Crispin Glover is definitely a thoroughly Lynchian archetype isn't he? The peeping-tom scene especially. <br /><br />Now you've made the comparison it seems so obvious. In fact, hard to believe Blue Velvet wasn't a direct influence on BttF.<br /><br />The second BttF film is also very interesting from this urban/suburban dystopia angle. The "good" Hill Valley is a consumerist. New Urbanite fantasy (complete with Cafe 80s - how prophetic!). The "bad" alternate future in which Biff has bought the town is a libertarian nightmare though, with murders everywhere, gambling, private security services etc. Interesting because this is actually something of an indictment of Reagan's eighties, a vision of neoliberalism taken to its logical extreme.Alex Nivenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05525684766446729078noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-16640792288161528062011-03-16T08:26:30.218+00:002011-03-16T08:26:30.218+00:00What a terrific post! More please!What a terrific post! More please!Mattnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-40734244227348492102011-03-15T21:06:58.509+00:002011-03-15T21:06:58.509+00:00Anonymous -
Yes there is the terror of contaminat...Anonymous -<br /><br />Yes there is the terror of contamination, mixture or intermingling (like that "voodoo" scene in Wild At Heart, or the fixation on scabs, fluids and saliva in Dune) . Eraserhead seems more traumatised by the act of conception than the actual baby. And I forgot about the "elephant conception" - which seems of a piece with the 'dirty' working class who invade Merrick's home (emerging from the smog), compared to the pristine medical surroundings run by pure-hearted rich doctors.David K Waynehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10756535951359716522noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-65371749225051700612011-03-15T21:06:55.952+00:002011-03-15T21:06:55.952+00:00conscious - well not exactly. he does say he was a...conscious - well not exactly. he does say he was afraid to go into psychoanalysis because he presumed it would harm his creativity, which his prospective shrink agreed could happen. he does seem to put a subconscious up there, a free association kind of pseudo-surrealism, more like the automatic writing of spiritualism. but he's aware what makes him happy and what scares him; that he's comforted by the white picket fence and the white couple, and frightened by the city:<br /><br />"Because I grew up in a perfect world, other things were a contrast. When I visited Brooklyn as a little kid, it scared the hell out of me. In the subway, I remember a wind from the approaching train, then a smell and sound. I had a taste of horror every time I went to New York.I visited my grandfather there, who owned an apartment building with no kitchens. A woman was cooking an egg on an iron - that really worried me. Every night my granddad unscrewed his car aerial so gangs wouldn't break it off - I could feel fear in the air." <br /><br />and he did put a razorwire fence around his hollywood hills estate...<br /><br /><br /><br /><i>JEREMY GILBERT-ROLFE <br /><br />I don't really know David Lynch's work very well but as far as I can see he is a person who works with the poetics of suburban sleaze, sort of a Galsworthy of the lumpenbourgeoisie. As the director of Blue Velvet and Twin Peaks he should of course be the obvious choice to direct the I-hope-soon-to-be forthcoming Nancy and Ronnie and Frank Story. ButI don't think that in the end the work does much more than tell Americans what they already want to hear, namely that the underside of the American psyche and of American society is a world which revolves around sex and ambition of a deformed sort. In actuality, however, it revolves around greed and the deformations of racism - neither of which really appear in Lynch's works, which cleave to the traditional, and surely very revealing, Hollywood device (or dream) of a world which, though flawed, is a place where everyone always seems to have all that they 'need,'and where the notion of race is absent or blurred. In the'alien'character in Twin Peaks, the notion of the foreign is psychologized rather than politicized as it most certainly is n o t in the domestic politics or foreign policy of the United States. Like Warhol and Galsworthy, Lynch is an artist of the Establishment, who helps the banal to feel superior to a banality which is in fact a mirror image of themselves, and does so by telling them that their world is naughty in the way they want it to be naughty rather than evil in a way that they are quite unwilling to confront. </i>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-15504030515596130872011-03-15T20:45:21.041+00:002011-03-15T20:45:21.041+00:00Qlipoth -
"shields the viewer from feeling v...Qlipoth -<br /><br />"shields the viewer from feeling voyeur-accessory and as you say offers enough ambiguity for critics to treat everything as critique of itself"<br /><br />Well, that is the great po-mo trick, which is why it complemented neoliberalism so well for the 'smart' viewer. Pornography itself certainly made use of this - from the 90s, there was a strange trend of "yes we're performing this numbing gender oppression, but you're watching it" (there were porn film-makers called "The Dark Brothers" who really played on this reflexivity). But 'ironic' reflexivity often ends up being the accepted norm. <br /><br />The supposed 'irony' of widespread rape jokes among British comedians (or Slovenian philosophers!) being a telling example. Comedians pretend they're being 'better' than that, but actually being far more brutal and ugly in their sexism than the 70s comedians that they've "knowingly" moved ahead from. Jimmy Carr's entire career seems to be based on this schtick.<br /><br />I'm not sure how conscious Lynch's racism is. He seems so simple-minded that he may not even be aware of it. A lot of what I once thought was 'irony' is just straight-laced ineptitude or idiocy in his films. American visual artists-cum-directors tend to use/hide behind decorative images to cover their narrative/thematic incompetence. But in working to 'shield' the viewer, yes. It certainly does the trick, like our new wave of racist, misogynist (but privileged, well-educated) comedians. Flattering us with "you're too clever to really be into this - even though you're spending money on it". The real flattery is assuming "we" have the luxury of treating it as a joke when convenient.David K Waynehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10756535951359716522noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-80610160500664060272011-03-15T20:41:20.035+00:002011-03-15T20:41:20.035+00:00not quite white, passing and hiding the difference...not quite white, passing and hiding the difference, is lynch's preoccupation (not quite white rita hayworth, robert blake painted white...the horror of miscegenation; merrick's mother raped by an elephant; in inland empire the white goddess womb perforated and filling with foreign gypsy shit. these horrors of mingling are lynch's big worries and what is done to prevent it his fantasies.<br /><br />"her family seems to have inspired him on numerous occasions."<br /><br />like aristo lisa's death in that car accident, and i hate to say it but dwarf= scorsese.<br /><br />the funniest line about eraserhead i saw was something about a man fainting at the sight of his own sperm.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-85869959879756628342011-03-15T20:16:01.682+00:002011-03-15T20:16:01.682+00:00"I do think Rossellini's 'foreigness&..."I do think Rossellini's 'foreigness' makes her fair game for Lynch's abuses"<br /><br />yes but even more specifically i think the relation is american slavery - the hostage taking, the mutilation, and rossellini was lynch's partner and has some close black relatives. (her family seems to have inspired him on numerous occasions.) but i really do think much of his work is delivering white supremacist violence in a surreal language (that shields the viewer from feeling voyeur-accessory and as you say offers enough ambiguity for critics to treat everything as critique of itself) and given a psychoanalytic glaze that shifts blame to and locates horror and evil in historical victims. -qlip/chabertAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-88143121727724364622011-03-15T17:31:13.202+00:002011-03-15T17:31:13.202+00:00I agree - but too many people settle for that delu...I agree - but too many people settle for that delusion, even if it drags them over a cliff much faster than any 'loony left' initiative. Any 'motivational' training I've been unfortunate to attend can sometimes feels like a Neuremberg Rally with Powerpoint - everyone eager to nod in 'positive' tandem no matter how miserable it'll make them in the long-term.David K Waynehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10756535951359716522noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-24067098571166352422011-03-15T16:52:40.801+00:002011-03-15T16:52:40.801+00:00Yeah, but the problem that the right has is that a...Yeah, but the problem that the right has is that another term for creating your own reality is being delusional.<br /><br />This is the kind of thing that intellectuals like Baudrillard miss when they critique neoliberal re-inventions of reality - there really is a real reality out there which is slowly grinding onwards underneath the dream.<br /><br />This is why for example the neoliberals are totally blind to the fact of peak oil, just as the Nazi's were blind to the fact that the Soviet Union could churn out 500 tanks a week.Phil Knighthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16214245608032305452noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-23367695037979453102011-03-15T15:21:05.278+00:002011-03-15T15:21:05.278+00:00But Wayne, David Lynch made a dancing dwarf talk b...But Wayne, David Lynch made a dancing dwarf talk backwards & everything. He's a <i>genius.</i><br /><br />No, seriously...very nice job, this. Uncanny how you addressed all the creeping suspicions/misgivings I started having about Lynch 25 years ago.Greyhooshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14161781141733273715noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-48134422919206735662011-03-15T12:56:10.519+00:002011-03-15T12:56:10.519+00:00Oh, and Paul -
Right-wing ideology's main mod...Oh, and Paul -<br /><br />Right-wing ideology's main modus operandi is to make 'real' and 'dream' worlds interchangeable. Since Goebbels, its been aware that the fiction is the best propaganda - create an unreality, and then propose a solution to it. Watch an hour of Fox News if you need evidence. This is the edge it usually has on the 'reality-based community'. 'Reality' is the impoverished 'public option' left for the poor, third world, minorities etc etc. A particularly cunning trick of right-wing ideology production is to treat the (relatively comfortable) western left as 'loony' - for failing to agree we all live in the best of all possible worlds.David K Waynehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10756535951359716522noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-77789182941510675062011-03-15T12:29:55.599+00:002011-03-15T12:29:55.599+00:00Phil -
Yes, so much of 80s culture was a huge con...Phil -<br /><br />Yes, so much of 80s culture was a huge con. I think this has had a long-term effect on the critical faculties of those who grew up then. Around 1990, when Lynch was everywhere - Twin Peaks, Julee Cruse LP, the truly dreadful Wild At Heart, he seemed to stand out in a cultural wasteland. Mainly for throwing in a few striking images here and there, cunning use of music and a few other gimmicks - I was SUCKERED. American film was in such a bad state at the time that anything remotely out-of-the ordinary was eagerly grasped by his core audience: pretentious boys in their late teens/early 20s.<br /><br />Paul - <br /><br />I don't agree. Whenever I've viewed a Lynch film among an audience, there's always (nervous) laughter at the 'irony' and the assumption that his films are 'ambigious', at some critical remove from the black and white silliness onscreen. I think this is Lynch's most effective con. The bad pacing, the silly performances, the narrative clumsiness, the cheesy dialogue like Laura Dern's 'robins' speech - Lynch means it. He can't direct performances very well - hence the hamminess from less disciplined actors. His simplified 'all-American' worldview is represented by his very conventional plots (yes - CONVENTIONAL. Spouting exposition backwards or punctuating gunfights with some non-sequitor is just his window-dressing). At the end of Blue Velvet, Jefferey is fully at ease with the world. It's Dorothy who must bear the burden of 'ambiguity'. Read any inteview with Lynch - he takes things very much at face value, and he is unashamedly right-wing. He's no Michael Haneke. Other directors from his generation, whatever the quality - like Cronenberg, Jarmusch and the Coens, despite their stylisitc tics, have 'matured' by making their concerns more apparent. Inland Empire was like the result of handing a toddler a camera and a talented cast. <br /><br />If it walks like a duck etc... <br /><br />Qlipoth - <br />I do think Rossellini's 'foreigness' makes her fair game for Lynch's abuses (he got 'brave' enough to abuse blonde WASPS as his reputation inflated out of all proportion). And yes, the racial stereotypes got more pre-war offensive with further films. Richard Pryor in Lost Highway? I seriously doubt Lynch would have cast him in full health at his most dynamic and 'powerful', but as a visibly ailing 'servant' he slots nicely into Lynch's Republican utopia. And the misogyny is as 'ambiguous' as Hitchcock's - it's clear and present for all to see. There's also the Elephant Man, which repeat viewings show as very hostile to the poor (the Victorian working class were just EVIL - how right-wing is that?), and reverential to the wealthy - as a superior 'species' (as though a medical exploitation is morally superior to entertainment exploitation).<br /><br />Despite this, I still quite like Eraserhead and Mullholland Drive, for one reason: They take one uncomfortable, ugly emotion and squeeze it dry (respectively, reluctant parenthood and sexual jealousy). But even there, he'd be a lot more 'brave' if he reversed the genders of the protagonists (lesbianism in Mullholland Drive is a cop out I can't be bothered elaborating on, but you get the idea). Then they really would be uncomfortable to watch. As it is, he's deeply, deeply conservative; and as artistically childish as Zemeckis, Spielberg etc.David K Waynehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10756535951359716522noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-52039757864518594962011-03-14T16:48:53.942+00:002011-03-14T16:48:53.942+00:00oh, and, wonderful post
this is funny:
http://...oh, and, wonderful post<br /><br /><br /><br /><br />this is funny:<br />http://www.toplessrobot.com/2010/09/back_to_the_future_is_evil_rapey_racist.php<br /><br />and<br /><br />" Dorothy is often described as a 'femme fatale', Jane Greer, Barbara Stanwyck or Joan Bennett were never this willingly victimised; but then 40s noir rarely added 'failed' motherhood to its locus of betrayals (a notable exception being Mildred Pierce"<br /><br />Given Lynch's racial preoccupations might it be safe to suppose "Dorothy" suggests Dandridge?Qlipothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17343878659776948134noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-66258568107903948522011-03-14T16:17:11.505+00:002011-03-14T16:17:11.505+00:00The only non-white people visible in either film a...<i>The only non-white people visible in either film are 'Chuck Berry' and his band - taught how to play rock'n'roll by white Marty.</i><br /><br />I seem to recall booing in the theatre at the stereotype astonished face made by an employee of the diner.Qlipothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17343878659776948134noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-38400438703089008602011-03-14T12:44:01.246+00:002011-03-14T12:44:01.246+00:00"both films are about entry into (and escape ..."both films are about entry into (and escape from) dream worlds"<br /><br />Surely the structure of Blue Velvet is more complicated than a simple opposition of "real" and "dream" worlds. As explored more explicitly in Lynch's later films, the relationship between reality and fantasy is depicted as tangled and non-heirarchical. The very hyperreality of the idyllic suburb makes it seem less real than the obscene oedipal dream world, as confirmed by the materialisation of the robin from Sandy's dream. It seems to me that the apparent consolidation of right-wing morality should not be taken at face value then. In fact the prevailing sense of unreality at the end (and beginning) of the film always leaves me with a disturbing sense of non-resolution and moral ambiguity.Paulhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05546934750238244786noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6417337773760045947.post-74400640000519061442011-03-14T01:08:03.174+00:002011-03-14T01:08:03.174+00:00I think this is the best thing you've written ...I think this is the best thing you've written Mr. Kasper - and I don't mean that lightly, as I rate your writing very highly.<br /><br />But what it does suggest, at a deeper level, is that 80's culture was a con (which indeed I think it was).<br /><br />Obviously my position here is going to be very predictable (the con was enabled by cheap oil resulting from the opening up of the North Sea and the Alaskan North Slope), but it is fascinating how a whole philosophy of apologetics manifested itself as soon as Reagan appeared to grant it legitimacy.Phil Knighthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16214245608032305452noreply@blogger.com