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Twin Peaks, Ep. 2.02, “Coma”: The mystification of Laura Palmer

The dualities of Lynchian art are always interesting and always compelling in their simplicity. They reveal something, in their best moments, that is not typically talked about or openly acknowledged. Binaries are so easy to use, good versus evil, but when David Lynch manipulates them, he is uniquely capable of showing us the phoniness and feebleness of these structures.

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Twin Peaks, Ep. 2.01, “May The Giant Be With You”: The pressure of a phenomenon

The question of who killed Laura Palmer holds a particular and acute power. Not only did it captivate millions of people in 1990, but it has continued to have the same effect on millions more in the decades since thanks to home video and, most importantly, Netflix. When I first started watching Twin Peaks as a teenager some years ago, I wasn’t as familiar with the phenomenon, having only been told by many about how powerful the show’s legacy has become. The first season of David Lynch and Mark Frost’s series immediately gripped me, not only with that central question but (more importantly) with the remarkable world and its characters that these men had carefully crafted.

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Twin Peaks, Ep. 1.07, “Realization Time” hypnotically ties narratives and cherry stems together

With the sheer breadth of stories being told on an average episode of Twin Peaks, it’s startling to take a step back and realize that each episode only covers a period of 24 hours. While not as slavishly devoted to calling attention to its timeframe in the way The Killing or 24 was, Twin Peaks is a show focused on the day-to-day of the town, beginning each episode with the prerequisite cup of coffee and ending on the wind blowing through the deserted streets and forest. The basic nature of that structure only makes it more remarkable to consider how much happens in a single day, and how good the writers are at keeping the momentum of each plot going as the season progresses.

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Twin Peaks, Ep. 1.05, “The One-Armed Man” ties man and beast to the investigation

While Twin Peaks is easy to praise for both its alien-like atmosphere and the skill with which it constructed the Laura Palmer investigation, neither of these aspects would resonate to the degree they do if they weren’t built on the solid framework of the show’s world. The residents of Twin Peaks are all distinctly drawn characters with their own set of quirks, biases, and motivations; many of which are only tangentially related to Laura’s death. David Lynch said at the time and in many interviews since that he considered the murder the entry point to the rest of the town, and that in an ideal world it would have turned into a perpetual motion machine of story as their lives progressed.

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Twin Peaks, Ep. 1.04, “Rest In Pain” buries Laura Palmer and unearths cryptic facts

When the viewer enters the world of Twin Peaks, they do it at close to the exact same time Laura Palmer leaves it. Whoever she was is gone entirely, departed off to heaven, hell, the darkness in the woods, the strange red room in Cooper’s dream, or perhaps to nowhere at all. Cooper and the Twin Peaks police department can overturn every stone in town until they find the killer, but nothing they do is going to bring her back. The only thing that’s left behind is a body growing colder by the minute, and the memories of a town that loved her without truly understanding anything about her.

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Twin Peaks, Ep. 1.03, “Zen, Or The Skill To Catch A Killer” expands the mystery with dances and dreams

Throughout his career, David Lynch has always paid tribute to the role of dreams in his art and storytelling. He once described his appreciation of the form as such: “Waking dreams are the ones that are important, the ones that come when I’m quietly sitting in a chair, letting my mind wander. When you sleep, you don’t control your dream. I like to dive into a dream world that I’ve made or discovered; a world I choose … right there is the power of cinema.” Lynch’s best works are the pieces that exist perfectly in an elusive feeling, where you’re unsure if you’re awake or still dreaming. Blue Velvet is a walking nightmare for poor Jeffrey Beaumont that shows him the worst of life, while Mulholland Drive’s narrative defies categorization on what is reality and what is a dream.

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Twin Peaks, Ep. 1.02: “Traces To Nowhere” establishes oddly effective beats of investigation

After the tour de force performance that was the pilot of Twin Peaks, the most important of the many questions raised was how on earth this would be able to sustain a weekly series. Its vision was so unique and its oddness so carefully calibrated that it was easy to understand why so many of the critics who first reviewed it and loved it gave it zero chance of mainstream success, even while you could also understand why ABC would take a chance on its vision.

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A Girl, her Girls, and Creativity, Gone Wild in ‘Inland Empire’

Inland Empire Written and directed by David Lynch 2006, USA David Lynch’s last film is his most mentally exhausting and participatory, coming in at a minute under three hours. For as long as he has been active – approaching five decades now, from when he started making short films in the late ’60s – Inland …

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‘Eraserhead’: Consumed by the best of both worlds

Eraserhead Written and directed by David Lynch 1977, USA Midway through Eraserhead, David Lynch’s midnight-black dreamscape, the terror is momentarily interrupted by the hauntingly breathtaking song, whispered by the disfigured chipmunk-cheeked chanteuse, Lady in the Radiator (Laurel Near), as if to let the audience in on something indescribable, to give them an out from the …

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‘The Tenant’ is a psychological puzzle

The Tenant Directed by Roman Polanski France, 1976 Featuring Roman Polanski’s last major appearance in one of his own films, The Tenant completes the director’s look at paranoid city life, begun  with 1965’s Repulsion. Polanski plays Trelkovsky, a shy man who becomes convinced that his neighbors are scheming to drive him to suicide. Like Rosemary’s …

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Twin Peaks, Ep. 1.01: “Northwest Passage” is brilliant world-building, wrapped in plastic

In the nearly 25 years since Twin Peaks debuted on ABC, the show has achieved an almost mythic status in the canon of television. Not only has it influenced a legion of other shows, but its various elements and images have become indelible parts of pop culture. Appreciation of cherry pie and damn good coffee. A lady with a log that she treats like a beloved pet. A dwarf dancing in a room with red curtains and a zig-zag carpet. When people think of Twin Peaks, they think of its oddities, and with good reason: the surreality is so distinct that it lingers long after the details surrounding it have faded.

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‘Twin Peaks’ set to return in 2016

In a surprise announcement earlier today, David Lynch and Mark Frost followed up their recent tweets by confirming that Twin Peaks would indeed be returning to television. Twin Peaks is set to return on Showtime in 2016, with all nine episodes of the new series being directed by Lynch himself, Deadline reports. Dear Twitter Friends: That gum you …

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The Definitive ‘What the F**k?’ Movies: 10-1

10. Altered States (1980) Directed by: Ken Russell Is it a horror film? Many of Ken Russell’s films could be argued as such, but there’s enough in Altered States that makes it less horror and more science fiction/psychological thriller. Based on the novel by Paddy Chayefsky, Altered States introduced the world to William Hurt (and …

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The Definitive ‘What the F**k?’ Movies: 20-11

20. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998) Directed by: Terry Gilliam So…drugs, right? Based on Hunter S. Thompson’s 1971 novel of the same title, Fear and Loathing stars Johnny Depp and Benicio del Toro as Raoul Duke and Dr. Gonzo, respectively. The pair is heading to Sin City, speeding through the Nevada desert, under …

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The Definitive ‘What the F**k?’ Movies: 30-21

30. Conspirators of Pleasure (1996) Directed by: Jan Švankmajer We’ve already seen two films from Jan Švankmajeron the list, but this elaborate movie about a number of separate, but connected people takes the cake. Conspirators of Pleasure follows six people, each with their own incredibly unsettling fetish. A letter carrier ingests dough balls every night before …

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David Lynch adds a Double Shot Express to his Ice Bucket Challenge while Playing ‘Over The Rainbow’ on his Trumpet

Patrick Stewart, Kermit the Frog and the Foo Fighters all entertained us with their ALS Ice Bucket Challenges, and just when I was ready to stop posting these videos, David Lynch came along and accepted his challenge from both Laura Dern and Justin Theroux. Lynch doesn’t do anything incredibly challenging here, but I couldn’t resist …

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‘The Elephant Man’ and the Sensual Experience of Form

Painted on the canvas in primitive colors was a life-size portrait of the Elephant Man. This very crude production depicted a frightful creature that could only have been possible in a nightmare. It was the figure of a man with the characteristics of an elephant. The transfiguration as not far advanced. There was still more …

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The Definitive Kubrickian Films: 10-1

What’s difficult about making this list is finding a balance between a successful Kubrickian film that either predates or pays homage to Kubrick and, for lack of a better term, is a ripoff. Now that we’ve hit the apex, it’s clear that these are, regardless of influence, quality films. What sets them apart is their …

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‘Harry Dean Stanton: Partly Fiction’ – The quiet man in a quiet portrait

In keeping with the acting style of the subject of its focus, Sophie Huber’s Harry Dean Stanton: Partly Fiction stays away from extremes in its portrait of one of America’s greatest actors. There is affection, but it is understated and not glowing, while any melancholy elements are not over-stressed.

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‘Bad Milo’ Movie Review – laboured and ridiculous, but not altogether unfunny.

In an episode of Community, Britta (played by Gillian Jacobs) once said that an analogy is “a thought with another thought’s hat on.” It may be laboured, clumsy, and teetering on the gobbledygook, but what she said was not altogether incorrect. In fact, that’s pretty much the reason why the scene was funny. Jacob Vaughan’s Bad Milo, in which Jacobs co-stars, deals with a metaphor that, in its execution, feels very much the same way: laboured and ridiculous, but not altogether unfunny.

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Director and Actress Duos: The Best, Overlooked, and Underrated

Riffing on Terek Puckett’s terrific list of director/actor collaborations, I wanted to look at some of those equally impressive leading ladies who served as muses for their directors. I strived to look for collaborations that may not have been as obviously canonical, but whose effects on cinema were no less compelling. Categorizing a film’s lead …

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EIFF 2013: Harry Dean Stanton profiled in the terrific ‘Partly Fiction’

In keeping with the acting style of the object of its focus, Sophie Huber’s Harry Dean Stanton: Partly Fiction stays away from extremes in its portrait of one of America’s greatest actors. There is affection, but it is understated and not glowing, while any melancholy elements are not over-stressed. The facts and opinions expressed, through Stanton and various collaborators, are simply allowed to be – free of added manipulation – in what amounts as a rather quiet documentary, excluding film clips with their own soundtracks and instances in which we get to see Stanton express his passion for performing music. Like the documentary’s most discussed film, Paris, Texas (1984), Partly Fiction is serene but also apt at emotional devastation, though as in Wim Wenders’ masterpiece, sorrow and optimism are intertwined.

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