Lost Highway's Plot

[Thomas Melle]

OK, I just took a quick look at the pync-l archives since I was wondering
about his new book and its releasing date - so I'm not hip to the lingo of
you all ("er - pardon me?"), since I quit pynchon list when I left Germany
a year ago.
But as far as I saw, Richard ROMEO claimed that LOST HIGHWAY did not have
any underlying reality, and no one gave any rejection to this. I saw LH
three times, and I am more than sure that there is, in fact, an underlying
plot (and that, by the way, the whole film is Lynch's masterpiece). I want
to outline this plot really quick, as I have destilled it from the apparent
nightmare (only the second half of the movie is a dream):

1) The key sentence of the film is the following one, spoken by Fred to one
of the police officers: "I like to remember things my way." That's what
Fred will do, after he is put to sleep by the drugs that the jail doctor
forces into his throat ("Now you will sleep"). From this point on, he
re-dreams the story of the murders he committed - in his way. You can call
it psychogenic fugue, if you will, but I think, good old Schizophrenia will
do as well.
2) He is married with Renee. Her past is bothering him, more, it is driving
him mad - she used to be a porn-actor. Deep inside, he is scared to not
really possess her (She will tell Pete (Fred's alter ego) that he will
never have her - after they have sex in the bright spotlight of a car). Her
past is the reason why he doesn't like cameras. In regularly reocurring
states of madness, however, he is filming himself and Renee in their bed.
Renees porno-producer was Dick Laurent.  She still maintains a secret
relationship to Dick Laurent, mediated by party-gringo Bill dayton. While
Fred plays the sax in a club, she sleeps with Dick Laurent.
3) The chronology of the narrated evening is - perhaps - the following:
Fred asks if renee wants to join him to the club where he'll be playing.
She says she'll stay at home and read. ("Read? Read what?") In the club,
Fred watches Renee meeting Bill, then he worried sees them leave. He tries
to call at home, but no one responds.
Then he drives to the "Lost Highway" Hotel and knocks Dick Laurent down,
after his wife has slept with him and left. He will recall this scene two
times later in jail, under the influence of drugs, one time as himself, one
time as Pete. How he knows, where they are, why they are in the "Lost
Highway" hotel? I don't know. He takes Dick Laurent in his trunk out for a
ride. When Fred opens the trunk in the midst of nowhere, Dick has regained
consciousness - they fight. Fred wins and urges Dick to watch the old
pornos he produced, starring his wife, with his watchcam. Then he shoots
him. (A little deviation about the Mystery Man: He kills the man in Fred's
later remembrance of the scene - in general, this man is some kind of a
personification of Fred's "fugue" personality, and he partly blames him for
his deeds, a "demon" that whispers cruel commands into his ears...)
After that, Fred and Renee are on Bill's party. Renee is drunk and acts
obscenely. Fred gulps down two drinks and imagines the (brilliant)
conversation with the Mystery Man. After that, he asks Bill who that man
is. "A friend of Dick Laurent." - "Dick Laurent? But Dick Laurent is dead,
isn't he?" - He leaves the party with Renee. She explains how she made the
acquaintance of Bill - in unprecise terms ("just a job"). Later, this
conversation will be elaborated between Pete and blonde Renee. In this
night, Fred kills his wife with his videocam recording. He is put to jail
the other morning. He gets drugs in jail, since he acts weird and his head
causes great "pain". Then the transformation into Pete takes place in his
mind. Furtheron, the film mixes patches of the things that really happened
with Fred's new dreamed existence as Pete. --
4) Dick Laurent = Mr. Eddy, of course, but the connection is more profound:
He offers pornos to Pete, he threatens Pete that he will kill him, when
he'll touch blonde Renee. Pete (Fred) is not the "first man" in his beloved
girl...
5) Notice the similarity of Fred and Pete having sex. Note the cramped
sadness of it.
6) The license plates have supposedly a meaning, but I didn't get it yet,
or Lynch is just mocking around...

I know that there are still mysteries and things that fall out of the plot
I outlined, but that belongs to the conception of the film. Wouldn't it be
boring to explain it all away? LH is wide open to more interpretations. 
Perhaps you want to watch the movie once again now, and detect more
connections and details, that point to a "real" plot behind the surface
structure of the film. The lamps (the lamp in Pete's room reflects the jail
neon light), the color of Rennes hair, the different faces cut into Fred's
face in the very last scene - there are a lot of things to discover. The
film is clearer and more structured than any of Lynch's films before. There
is more to this movie than dreams and modern fairies and monsters - to
label it away with "just another of those weird nightmare Lynchees" does no
justice to this unique masterpiece.

Take care now - and when the %%%% will M&D now be released??

Thomas