Everything Is Fine
I showed Eraserhead to a friend recently. It's one of my favorite films, but not easy to recommend. Luckily, my friend liked it, though we had completely different interpretations.
I don't think I've ever written about Eraserhead on this blog. Maybe I'll discuss it at greater length some other time. Suffice it to say it's David Lynch's surrealistic first feature, and while some declare it a masterpiece, others think it trash.
For instance, here are how some people described their comments at IMDb:
If there was a verb for raping ones psyche, it would be called "eraserhead"
Having Your Pre Frontal Lobes Massaged By Edward Scissorhands,
The reason I can't sleep at night...,
And those are people who liked it. That's an old punchline, but true in this case. Here are comments from those who couldn't stand it.
The worst film ever made. Ever. Ever ever everI wasted time from my life on Eraserhead; maybe I can save you from the same mistake
It's kind of like having a mutated unicorn claw at the inside of your stomach
I'd rather kick myself in the balls than watch this again
Any film that gets reactions this strong must be worth something.
posted by LAGuy @ 12:07 AM
8 Comments:
I fell asleep both times I tried to watch it. I dunno maybe it was like hypnotic
Well, Lynch has described the film as a "dream of dark and troubling things."
"Kick myself in the balls"
Are you sure you aren't talking about Idiocracy?
Me too, NEGuy. The same way I can't get more than 20 pages into The Sound And The Fury without putting it down for another book.
Yeah well I once listened to "Absalom Absalom" as an audiobook in backwards order (part 3, part 2 and then part 1) and didn't notice until I went check something later in the actual book. Then again I once did that with a Joyce Carol Oates book too
The Sound And The Fury gets easier as it goes along.
I find Eraserhead compelling from start to finish, even though it doesn't always use conventional narrative techniques. In any case, it's not hard to get through--once you start it, no matter what it's over in 90 minutes.
I have liked Eraserhead for years (and own a copy!). It is a film for when you want to experience a sense of dread without knowing why. I like Lynch primarily for his ability to create such feelings without the need for narrative. The best part of Dune, Blue Velvet, Mullholland Drive and Lost Highway are their images (though the story in Mullholland Drive is pretty compelling, once you fifure it out). I've never watched Straight Story - I've heard it is not very "Lynchian."
Straight Story, as the title suggests, is pretty straightforward. It lacks the Lynchian surrealism so common in most of his work. Maybe he did it to show he could. It's not bad. But it's no Eraserhead.
Eraserhead feels less weird today than it did originally simply because Lynch's style and themes have become well-known. But I'd still say he's never topped this, his first feature. (Though if you ever saw his short film The Grandmother you'd see he already had a lot of the obsessions that would take over Eraserhead.)
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