We begin our month-long tribute to the work of David Lynch with his unsettling debut film.
Two Cents is a Cinapse original column akin to a book club for films. The Cinapse team curates the series and contribute their “two cents” using a maximum of 200-400 words. Guest contributors and comments are encouraged, as are suggestions for future picks. Join us as we share our two cents on films we love, films we are curious about, and films we believe merit some discussion. Would you like to be a guest contributor or programmer for an upcoming Two Cents entry? Simply watch along with us and/or send your pitches or 200-400 word reviews to [email protected].
The Pick: Eraserhead
After his recent passing, we knew we had to do something to celebrate the dreamlike, captivating work of David Lynch. And what better place to start than his debut feature film, 1977’s Eraserhead. Made as his thesis with the American Film Institute, Eraserhead took nearly six years to complete, and became an immediate midnight movie sensation. Telling the surreal story of Henry Spencer, a common man who finds himself carrying for an infant that barely resembles a human being, it’s reputation for both its technical craft and unique vision led to Lynch being tapped immediately to make more mainstream work (including eventually the first film adaptation of Dune.) But it was the personal, experimental art films like Eraserhead that would become Lynch’s legacy. But what do we think about it?
Featured Guest
Matt Jeanes
Have you listened to Eraserhead lately? For as singularly fantastic as the movie looks, it’s the sound that really sinks its teeth into me. Distant winds, low mechanical hums, vaguely threatening electrical drones, buzzers, and mechanical factory noises provide much of the film’s atmosphere, and it’s nearly impossible to tell where the film’s sound design ends and its score begins.
In fact, most of the film’s commercially-released soundtrack album is a work of atonal menace. Just as the movie would eventually inspire a generation of visual artists and filmmakers, the score anticipates much of what the ambient drone community would commit to tape for decades after its release. The sound envelops the listener unlike almost any other soundtrack album, and it can be overwhelming. I’ve listened to the album many times and there’s almost always a moment when I don’t know which of the hums and rumbles are coming from the record and which are just a part of the soundscape of the real world.
The soundtrack works on its own, even divorced from the film’s stark black and white imagery. I can put the movie on in the background, not even look at the screen, and still be completely transported into Henry’s dark world of anxiety and confusion. With so few spoken words in the film, the sound has a lot of work to do, and it’s always up to the task.
Every organ drone, telephone ring, or fan blowing through a tube helps to keep us in Henry’s world. We may not know exactly what he’s thinking, but we can surely hear what he’s hearing and it’s never comfortable. From the baby’s shrieks to the factory’s sparks, there’s no rest. Even the beautiful song from the lady in the radiator is ominous and otherworldly. She sings “In Heaven, everything is fine” but if this is as fine as things get, we can begin to understand some of Henry’s distress, and we have David Lynch and Alan R. Splet to thank for that.
Our Team
This week’s selection gave me two opportunities I was more than happy to take advantage of…
First, I was able to introduce my wife – who previously refused to watch this one – to this wildly weird and mind warping film. She’s a fan of Lynch, notably a huge fan of all things Twin Peaks. However, the visuals she’s seen from Eraserhead always kept her disinterested in watching this film. But a recent rewatch of the Eli Roth’s History of Horror that hits on Eraserhead and a good excuse to watch it helped push her to agree. That and the fact she was nice and high at the time.
That leads to my second opportunity – watching this one while utilizing my medical marijuana prescription, something I’d yet to attempt. And boy, was that a choice. After pleasant recent experiences watching Chompy and the Girls and Freaked while on edibles, I felt like I was ready for this. I was… but I also wasn’t. Same goes for the missus, whose misophonia was on full tilt with all of the gross sounds coming out of the “baby”.
In some senses, this film is nothing more than a weirdo student film that you’d see from a pretentious film school nerd. Yet, it’s so much more. One thing that really stood out on this rewatch was just how comfortable Lynch was with discomfort. Long pauses so pregnant they are overdue, coupled with awkward dialog and/or extremely uncomfortable imagery really work to create an almost unbearable sense of both dread and awe. This film is all in the tone and that tone is one of beautiful and painful discomfort.
Needless to say, this was well worth a rewatch and a great way to kickoff a month of celebrating one of the best filmmakers in American history.
So like Justin, I got to watch Eraserhead this time in a unique state. But unlike him, I wasn’t on any heightening medication; I just had what I am suspecting was a low-grade norovirus. So for the squishier aspects of the film…let’s just say my stomach appreciated that it was in black and white.
That said, I hadn’t seen the film in forever, and certainly not since I had children, which does solidify a lot of the films themes and perspective for me. The dehumanizing industrial landscape, the odd human behavior, the blending and bleeding of dreams into reality: these are all the cornerstones of Lynch’s concerns. But at its core this film is about how unbelievably weird and hard it is to take care of a child (an infant in particular) and how it can feel like it robs you large parts of your humanity. The psycho-sexual tension of Jack Nance’s portrayal of Henry dives into how he has found himself thrust into a whole new set of responsibilities he neither asked for or especially wants when all he wants is to get along with his life and get laid.
This will likely come up throughout our Lynch series for me, but I think one of the more underrated aspects of Eraserhead is the way it shifts in moments into pitch-black comedy and then back again so effortlessly. Lynch clearly had a wicked sense of humor that shows up throughout his work, as well a devilish playfulness. Allen Joseph’s bizarre behavior as Mr. X is equal parts unsettling and hilarious, and the titular dream sequence where Henry’s head is literally used to make pencil eraser is so absurdist that it defies real description.
But as with much of Lynch’s work, that is the joy of it all. His knack for creating images and scenarios that felt singular but also universal would quickly become his calling card. He is the most exciting kind of artist, who felt like he had to get the visions that crowded his brain out for the world to also witness.
Join us for the rest of our Lynch celebration for the rest of the month:
