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We lost David Lynch last week—as if that were even possible. We can’t lose him any more than we can shed our recurring dreams or our desire to be swept into surreality to understand this existence.
The incomparable director, who died at age 78, was as much a conduit as a craftsman. Movie cults like the kind that formed around Blue Velvet (1986), Mulholland Drive (2001) and Eraserhead (1977) rarely arise on behalf of technical wizards or clever writers. Those folks are too easy to explain. Lynch could speak through indescribable emotion, and it made him one of the most revered American artists of the past 50 years.
Particularly in the Pacific Northwest, his cult runs in the water and nests in the soil.
With Twin Peaks (1990–91), he cemented in the popular consciousness our fir trees, our damn good coffee, and the region’s simultaneous sense of friendliness and hauntedness. The shadowy forests surrounding Laura Palmer and Dale Cooper were rich in chaos, beauty and the kind of mysticism that insists we mortals have no control over the forces of nature or even ourselves—Northwest bards from Ken Kesey to Frank Herbert would agree. Twin Peaks literally helped create a new American film town in North Bend, Wash., a mini-movie mecca that spawned a film festival (2018–2022). Lynch’s fandom has also helped keep North Bend’s historic movie theater operational.
Zooming in further, Lynch’s status in Portland’s film culture is undeniable. In December, three nights of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (once considered a lesser Lynch entry) sold out at Clinton Street Theater. The appetite to experience his work in communal form remains frenzied. In the days after his passing, repertory screenings have popped up left and right—from the Hollywood to Tomorrow to Cinemagic.
Thinking about the depths of pain, terror, sorrow and hope that live in Lynch films like The Elephant Man (1980) and Lost Highway (1997), it’s hard even now to imagine the emotional frequencies that could hum through Portland theaters this month and next. What’s more, the morning after his death, the David Lynch shelf at Movie Madness (usually dozens of discs deep) was all but empty. It’s common knowledge around the store that Lynch films (many of which aren’t streaming) are some of the most sought-after titles in the collection.
Hollywood Theatre marketing coordinator Randall Rego says Wild at Heart (1990) is consistently among Movie Madness’ most-rented movies of the year, “surrounded by what are otherwise new releases.” Those looking for a pilgrimage shorter than the trek to North Bend can pay respects to the prosthetic ear from Blue Velvet, which lives in the Movie Madness memorabilia collection, with a lock of Lynch’s own hair dangling from the rubber.
Despite his 10 feature films, dozens of shorts, and revolutionary forays into television, Lynch was one of the few filmmakers whose legacies resonated outside of the stories he told or things he did with a camera. You could have just as much fun ranking the top 100 buzzes, clangs and wahwahwah’s in Lynch movies as the movies themselves. Or, name a director with a higher adoration rating among his actors. If you want to see Kyle MacLachlan, Laura Dern or Naomi Watts light up, find an interview in which they’re talking about Lynch.
In his later years, he conquered the internet and its slow tendency to ruin everything by being utterly himself at all times. The daily weather reports, the whitening pompadour, his bizarre dietary recitations—they only ever made his work feel more fun and mysterious.
Perhaps most instructively, in a popular film culture obsessed with spoon-feeding the viewer story details and walling off plot holes, Lynch is synonymous with narrative work that teaches us not to be so hung up on narrative. His films are synonymous with budding cinephilia (“hey, what basement did you watch your first Lynch in?”) yet so fathomless that the young cinephile never ages out of the spell. His movies are both the gateway to experimental cinema and the realm itself.
To be sure, it’s been heartbreaking to witness Lynch devotees’ pain and disbelief around his death. Countless social media remembrances contain some semblance of the idea: “I didn’t think he actually could die.”
A fierce advocate for transcendental meditation, Lynch more or less agreed.
“Consciousness lives on,” he told NPR last year. “The body is like a car, and the driver is the spirit, the bit of consciousness, the atom, the soul, you could say. And so the car gets old and rusted and falls apart, and the driver gets out and continues on.”
So, David Lynch’s car broke down last week after 78 years on the road. Now, a moment of silence. Then, a sound. The driver’s footsteps approach.
Lynch’s visions
Where to see David Lynch films in the coming weeks.
Cinema 21: Eraserhead (1977), Jan. 31
Cinemagic: Mulholland Drive (2001), Feb. 1 and 4. Lost Highway (1997), Jan. 31, Feb. 1 and 2. David Lynch: The Art Life (2016), Feb. 2–4.
Hollywood: Blue Velvet (1986), Feb. 8 and 12 (sold out). Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (1992), Feb. 24 (sold out).
Tomorrow: Wild at Heart (1990), Feb. 22. Blue Velvet (1986), Feb. 22.