He fared much better with his own material in Blue Velvet (1986), which was also his last film to date with Splet. DeVore and Bergren also worked on the script of Dune (1984), albeit without a final credit, and Splet again did the sound design, but this time Lynch seemed hamstrung by the chore of adapting a complicated novel whose author (Frank Herbert) had veto power over the script, and he wound up with a top-heavy hodgepodge in this case Lynch’s lack of narrative skills proved to be fatal. There may have been something bogus and fatuous about the piety that Lynch brought to the material, but the script, by Christopher DeVore and Eric Bergren, was like a vehicle looking for an engine, and Lynch’s imagination - combined with the remarkable capabilities of Alan Splet, the sound man on Eraserhead - pretty much filled the bill.

When Lynch was hired by Mel Brooks to direct The Elephant Man (1980), he was able to incorporate a surprising amount of his own special qualities in someone else’s story, including a few effective nonnarrative interludes. The minimal sense of story made it possible for you to take your own sweet time to find your bearings, and Lynch’s rich imagination guaranteed that there was more than enough to keep you busy. Like certain experimental films, the movie simply took you somewhere and invited you to discover it for yourself. He also appeared to have practically no storytelling ability at all, and in the case of Eraserhead, this deficiency was actually more of a boon than a handicap. A painter-turned-filmmaker, Lynch started out with a highly developed sense of mood, texture, rhythm, and composition a dark and rather private sense of humor and a curious combination of awe, fear, fascination, and disgust in relation to sex, violence, industrial decay, and urban entrapment.

The progressive coarsening of David Lynch’s talent over the 13 years since Eraserhead, combined with his equally steady rise in popularity, says a lot about the relationship of certain artists with their audiences. With Nicolas Cage, Laura Dern, Diane Ladd, Willem Dafoe, Isabella Rossellini, Harry Dean Stanton, and Crispin Glover. For the record, I much prefer most or all of the features David Lynch has made since Wild at Heart, especially Inland Empire. This is another film (see capsule review of Rita, Sue and Bob Too, posted earlier today) released on Blu-Ray by Twilight Time.

Movies + wild at heart