NP: From the Lynch to the Solondz

[Steven Koteff]

Actually *Inland Empire *is the one Lynch movie we haven't yet watched. We
were going to watch it last night but I was running on three hours' of
Megabus sleep and didn't think I could do it justice for ~200 minutes.

I have also held out reading the last chapter of Lim's book about Lynch
because I don't want to get to it until after I watch the movie. The
biography is okay--want more biography of person and less biography of
director/figure. Didn't need him to interpret the movies for me but I
understand why that book exists. Most of the interesting bits are actually
just taken (sometimes with attribution, often not) from *Lynch on Lynch*,
which is a life-important read. Occasional interesting bits unique to the
Lynch bio include a few post-*Highway *production details (as *LoL *only
goes up to *Highway*) and things about, for instance, Lynch's dietary
habits--he now eats the same salad every day, mixed in a Cuisinart so every
bit tastes identical.

Also, if it means anything, the title of *IE *comes not just from the area
from the title of Lynch's dad's dissertation, which has something to do
with Douglas Firs in the region (Lynch's movies are full of personal
connections like this). His dad went on to work for the Forest Service,
which fact goes on to have a big impact on the types and number of places
Lynch grew up in. Probably you know most of this, but if not, you might
find it interesting.

If I can make particular sense of it or have an interesting take I'll let
you know. I'm new to the literature about Lynch, so forgive me for anything
that you've heard ad nauseum, but he's really, really, almost
idiosyncratically opposed to explanations or sense-making of his movies. He
has a semi-mystical belief that with each film he is attempting to
construct a sort of dreamspace, a world to be experienced as opposed to a
system to be understood. Lots of artists say this, for sure, only he's one
of the ones good enough that his stuff can succeed despite an absence of
logical coherence.

In terms of how good it is, I'm not sure I'll be the best judge, at this
point. When I get obsessed with an artist in the way I am with Lynch I lose
my ability to be a good judge of the work. He does so many things so
well--and so interestingly--at any given moment, that I read everything he
does as generously as possible, and attribute a sort of unified
purposefulness to all of it. Maybe it's a flaw of mine as a reader--I'm
that way with Pynchon, for sure. But I'm just never not learning from him,
never bored, never *outside *the movie. The obsession (mine with him and
his with the material) lets him be real/vivid/close enough to my experience
of his stuff that I very easily slip into/am seduced by the world. Lynch
would say that is the only measure of whether or not his work succeeds, I
guess.



On Thu, Feb 4, 2016 at 6:52 PM, Johnny Marr <marrja at gmail.com> wrote:

> I've also seen and liked Welcome to the Dollhouse, and have also failed to
> watch any other Solondz films.
>
> WTTD struck me as very 1990s in its employment of irony (but not so much
> irony as to smother the general morality).
>
> Steven, what did you make of Internal Empire? I watch it every three or
> four years, still can't love it but wit each viewing I feel more intrigued
> and simultaneously more enlightened yet also more confused. One
> interpretation I'be heard suggests it's a portrayal of method acting in
> extremis, as Laura Derm inhabits her character as much as she can in order
> to understand her role.
>
>
> On Friday, February 5, 2016, Perry Noid <coolwithdoc at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> "Weiner, *you* better get ready, 'cause at three o'clock today, I'm
>> gonna *RAPE you*!"
>>
>> It was one of those high school movies that my friends and I would rent
>> and watch if we could find nothing else at the video stop to agree on, or
>> the kind of movie to watch with friends who aren't exactly interested in
>> "arty" or "intellectual" movies because it has something for both types of
>> stoopid high schoolers, the indoor and outdoor kids (I'll let you all guess
>> which one of the two I was). Other movies like that for me were Dazed and
>> Confused, Harold and Maude, Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket, Swingers,
>> Trainspotting...the list goes on.
>>
>> I don't think I have seen any other Solondz flicks. Happiness has been on
>> my watchlist for quite a while. I worked at a teeny movie theater (before I
>> worked at the University film center, I worked in more than one theater
>> growing up) and missed it when we showed it way back when and just haven't
>> gotten around to seeing it yet. Lemme know what you think of Happiness
>> whenever you get to it.
>>
>> On Thu, Feb 4, 2016 at 3:45 PM, Steven Koteff <steviekoteff at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Just finishing David Lynch in our movie project (whom I have become sort
>>> of obsessed with; I can't overhype the esteem I hold him in now; he's on my
>>> internal Olympus of artmakers) and moving into Todd Solondz.
>>>
>>> We watched TS's *Welcome to the Dollhouse *last night, and I really
>>> recommend it to anyone who hasn't seen it. It's kind of a remarkable movie.
>>> It's really just the story of a very socially-unfortunate suburban
>>> 11-yr-old named Dawn. The persistent agony of her life as she comes of age.
>>> It manages to be remarkably sad and moving about straightforwardly
>>> emotional material without ever (in my opinion) becoming sentimental. It's
>>> interesting to watch it on the heels of Lynch's stuff, as they both include
>>> a lot of material that is overtly high-drama yet earn it in totally
>>> different ways, despite both embracing the drama head-on. Solondz is much
>>> dryer, though not at all disaffected. Very dark, very funny. Also maybe the
>>> best and truest treatment of young characters (and use of young actors) I
>>> can remember seeing in a movie. Maybe it helps that I was a child in
>>> roughly the same era of the movie. But I think it's really well-done. There
>>> are a few minor story elements I might quibble with, but not enough to
>>> really diminish the effect of the movie much.
>>>
>>> Anybody seen this thing? Is Solondz generally on your radar?
>>>
>>> Apparently his new movie stars Greta Gerwig as the girl from *Dollhouse
>>> *all grown up.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
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