Lynchian, by John Higgs

It’s been illuminating to read this short book exploring what it is about the work of David Lynch that so affects us as viewers, having just read Syd Field’s book on the foundations of screenwriting. Lynch’s work seems to break many if not all the rules of the classic screenplay. Not for him the three-act structure, or even cause and effect.

The blurb, a direct quotation from the first chapter (p. 5), sets out the territory:

“What is it about David Lynch’s cinematic bag of tricks — his shots of shadows and flickering electricity, his sinister soundscapes and his heartfelt scores, his dreamlike irrational stories — that affects us so deeply? How can he present us with trees swaying in the wind, or a character suddenly becoming another person, or more questions than answers, and it stays with us forever? And why is it that, when somebody else uses his tricks, it does not achieve the same results?”

Higgs argues “Lynchian” is more a description of process, even of a way of seeing the world, than particular elements seen on screen. In effect, Lynch uses the medium of film and TV to share his love/fascination with certain kinds of texture, space and feeling, from his peachy-keen delight in simple pleasures such as a cup of coffee to the disquiet of things going bump in the night.

It’s a compelling argument, a holistic view of Lynch. There are also lots of facts and tidbits I didn’t know, such as the various haunting images that were based on events in real-life, and the comparison of Lynch to his contemporaries, George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. 

Higgs addresses shortcomings, too — the lack of black characters and actors in so much of Lynch’s work, the sexual violence and misogyny that often features, and what we might call Lynch’s single-mindedness in his personal life. It feels fitting for a book on Lynch to probe into stuff that is a disturbing.

At just 107 pages plus end notes, it’s not an exhaustive study, and I’d have liked a bit more close analysis and detail. We gloss over some key texts, such as Lost Highway (1997), which electrified me at the time of release, not least because I’d been reading so much film theory on how to convey memory and experience beyond the immediate, present frame. Now I hanker to watch it again, and see if I can still make some semblance of sense of it.

I previous blogged and Higgs’s books on James Bond / the Beatles and on Doctor Who (and I get a name-check in the new edition of his book on the KLF). See also my thoughts on A Masterpiece in Disarray — David Lynch’s Dune an Oral History, by Max Evry.