Eraserhead

Tim, Alex, and I saw the midnight screening of David Lynch's debut feature, Eraserhead, tonight at the Nuart. The film debuted there in 1977 and played every weekend for seven years. It took Lynch five years to film it, mostly at the American Film Institute here in Los Angeles. The film is an uncompromised vision of self expression dealing with the darkest parts of human exsistence. Using subconcious archetypes and surreal images, Lynch presents themes and ideas concerning sex, creativity, birth, alienation, and the grotesque. Any interpretation is a worthy one, Lynch has never openly discussed the film in depth. Tim found it angnst riden, the work of a young man coming into himself and "sheding his clown suit." He saw it as an exorcism of the disturbed and isolated parts of the mind. The sound and music is absolutly incredible, constantly creating a tone that is downright heavy. The title is an interesting idea and metaphor. Tim saw the eraser looking head of the disturbed protaganist Henry as negative, representitive of the force that erases the creative spirit. I saw it as the idea of eraseing all rational thought and everything you ever knew from your mind to make way for The Other to rear its unknown head. Fans of this film include Mel Brooks (hired Lynch to direct Elephant Man after seeing it), Stanley Kubrick (he used to screen it in his house for friends), Terrence Malik (tried to raise funding for it), and Charles Bukowski (one of the only films he deemed worth watching.) This is Lynchs dreamy vision of one mans Hell on earth and, as he says, his most "spiritual movie."