Welcome to Lynchland (David Lynch, une énigme à Hollywood)
(France, 62 min.)
Dir. Stéphane Ghez
Programme: Cannes Classics
For all the idiosyncrasies and surrealism of his cinematic and artistic output, David was shockingly normal Lynch as a man in contrast. Born in Missoula, Montana in 1946 and raised in Bonner County, Idaho and Spokane, Washington, his early life during the 1950s and ‘60s proved to be integral to his work, with longstanding fascinations with iconic figures like Marilyn Monroe, Elvis Presley, and the Glinda from The Wizard of Oz providing fodder for many of his fantastical visions.
Stéphane Ghez’s brisk yet timely portrait of the man, who died this January, assembles an appropriately auspicious retinue of Lynch collaborators, providing a straightforward yet effective celebration of the man and his art. Participants include actors such as Naomi Watts, Isabella Rossellini, Laura Dern, and Kyle MacLachlan, as well as his former wives, his biographer, and others who knew the man and his craft.
Following a linear timescale so often eschewed in Lynch’s own work, Welcome to Lynchland follows the tale of a young painter who almost accidentally found an outlet through moving images. Cinema could extend the already shocking works he developed through paint. The five year journey making his debut feature Eraserhead is detailed, followed by the twin pillars of Hollywood opportunity he explored with The Elephant Man (under the producing banner of Mel Brooks, who makes a brief appearance) and the tumultuous Dino De Laurentiis production of Dune, adapting Frank Herbert’s “unfilmable” sci-fi novel.
Blue Velvet, made directly as a recompense for the debacle of his journey to Arrakis, solidified Lynch’s fascination with the darkness at the heart of many seemingly perfect small towns. The tale of a severed ear covered with ants leads down truly disturbing paths and, as Rossellini admits, there are some autobiographical elements drawn from the director’s own childhood, she brushes aside any simplistic or Freudian reading of what she and her collaborators achieved with this project.
Other beloved parts of his filmography such as Mulholland Dr., the Palme d’Or winner Wild at Heart, and Lost Highway are reflected upon, including by an “exegetical expert” who resembles a wizard and gamely tries to provide excuses why even his own search for singular meaning in Lynch’s work is futile. His final feature, Inland Empire (no doubt the most divisive of his films), is actually given considerable time for reflection, while the outlier in his filmography, The Straight Story, is given the short shrift.
Of course, the highly influential Twin Peaks project is highlighted significantly, from the ABC television series, to the film follow-up Fire Walk With Me, which gave more questions than answers for the curious, or the seemingly prophetic return after a quarter century with an 18 episode run on Showtime, Twin Peaks: The Return. While Lynch’s role as Gordon Cole in the series appears in the documentary, his other performances are skipped over entirely, including his sublime cameo in (superfan) Steven Spielberg’s exceptional film The Fabelmans where the irascible Lynch played the prickly John Ford.
We’ve had non-fiction works more fitfully explore Lynch and his obsessions, with Alexandre O. Phillippe’s exceptional ode Lynch/Oz telling the tale with a formal boldness befitting its subject matter, along with others like David Lynch: The Art Life and Shadows of Paradise. While Ghez playfully enters Lynch’s world, the diner setting showing MacLachlan noshing on hot coffee and pie, or the recreation of the Red Room from Twin Peaks, gives merely a superficial, decorative homage to Lynch’s filmography.
Despite its title welcoming us into the wild locale of Lynchland (or its even more hyperbolic French title that suggests somehow Lynch is unknowably enigmatic), Ghez’ film both succeeds at and is limited by its very nature, serving as a fine primer to the man’s work, but giving away very little save for a few clips and quips about the man and the work he has left behind. As an introduction, the film is perfectly fine (a welcome Welcome, as it were), and the new interviews are warmly received. In the end, however, it feels like little more than a well-assembled short piece that’s more comfortable as a supplement on a box set (many of the interviews were sourced from the likes of Criterion editions) rather than as a big screen documentary.
Still, for those unaware of the impact of the man on generations of filmmakers and fans, or simply dipping one’s toes into the somewhat sickly yet inviting pool of Lynch’s works, this film remains admirable. At the same time, though, its comfort in simplifying the telling of a story is at odds with Lynch’s own refusal to do so, which invites an awkward collision between subject and delivery. Despite its formal limitations, and notable omissions in its story of Lynch’s life and his career, there’s still much here to engage those already fans of the man, and likely to encourage newcomers to dive further into his remarkable artistry.
