The enduring image from a surprisingly few offered from David Lynch’s “Inland Empire” was of a close-up of Laura Dern’s eyebrows in an arch of confusion and fear.

That about sums it up.

No, just kidding but it’s probably safe to say that Lynch is closely aligned with Nietzche’s theory of eternal return, that there is absolutely no way  out of the nightmare we find ourselves in again and again. It will go on forever and..forever.

Why stick around if you have to watch what we probably all know by now? Repetition can be the hell of life but it can also lead to redemption in an odd way that I can’t fully grasp but feel is true. Because narrative is not everything and the bizarre-bitchin’ images he throws out is another reason.. A Family of Rabbits in a painting from Hopper with a laugh sound track? Polish (Hollywood?) hookers doing a 50’s dance number? A homeless Japanese and Black lady telling the most oddly affecting, rambling tale I have heard in quiet some time? Beyond that..well. There’s a lot of walking through sinister halls, beautiful lamps, and image-set-ups. One of his artifices is having an outstanding Laura Dern, in her trashy persona, begin these violent, weird stories that seem to connect over and over again. After the second one I laughed but no one in the Sunset 5 Theater did.

 BTW, I was happily surprised he cast the fine Polish actor Krzysztof Majchrzak. He is the epitome of sinister.

I may have read that Lynch ‘formed’ a storyline over a period of time and that may very well be true but maybe he really need not have bothered. It’s an art film. I really don’t think he can blarney-scratch that-explain- his way out of this one, as in “Mulholand Drive”. Freed from the constraints of budgetary concerns he blows it out. It’s weird though, the things I wanted more of was of the “Inland Empire” scenes which depict weird lower-class folks with either a Polish circus troupe or Russian (Polish?) mobsters. I suspect (no evidence) that Lynch just loved the name of a really ‘up and coming’ (read: Depressed Desert) place outside LA. He includes a few odd scenes that intrigue but go..? I do like his use of close-ups because with the use of DV it bleeds into the surreal, and that makes for a new way of seeing people and objects. (Note: a chum I was with said he did it because close-ups are more ‘forgiving’ on DV)

In my opinion, Lynch hits more than he misses.  I’m glad he is making films and for his body of work. It is really is inspirational in its own weird way. He does some very artistic things with the Sony PD150 or 170 cam and as always he right on regarding sound.  It is a work of art in itself.

rev. by Jerry Brewington