Despite being highly experimental, filmmaker David Lynch has had a far-reaching impact on not only films and television, but other forms of art as well, such as music and video games.
One of the most well-known directors often cited as being influenced by Lynch is Quentin Tarantino. The most commonly used examples are Blue Velvet and Wild at Heart and this isn't surprising as they portray violent criminals having trivial conversations. However, Tarantino is clearly a very different filmmaker and I definitely can't see him making something like Mulholland Drive or Inland Empire.
Tarantino's work has a very different tone and is much more meta and referential, and the Lynchian elements were more prominent in his early films like Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, and True Romance. He was most notably connected to Lynch by one of my favorite authors, David Foster Wallace.
Wallace considered the cutting off of the ear scene in Reservoir Dogs as a blatant reference to the severed ear of Blue Velvet. He also referred to the "long, self-consciously mundane dialogues on pork, foot massages, TV pilots, etc. that punctuate Pulp Fiction's violence" as textbook Lynch, as well as the "creepy/comic stylization" of the violence. He even went as far as to say that Tarantino's films wouldn't exist without David Lynch.
I think he might be overselling the connection a bit here, and I don't know that I agree with his characterization of Marcellus' neck bandage as Lynchian. But this article was written in 1996 and the work of the two directors has diverged strongly since then.
Tarantino may be over the top at times, but he never goes off the surrealist deep end like so much of Lynch's work since the late 90s. He has plot points that are unexplained like the briefcase in Pulp Fiction, but never anything as odd as The Log Lady. And while Tarantino has become even more reliant on references to other movies, Lynch seems to be largely unaware of current trends and has given the impression in interviews that he doesn't watch a lot of recently released films.
Furthermore, Tarantino famously pilloried Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me after its release, saying "David Lynch had disappeared so far up his own ass that I have no desire to see another David Lynch movie until I hear something different. And you know, I loved him."
A slightly more surprising director that was strongly inspired by David Lynch, at least to me, was Stanley Kubrick. The legendary filmmaker at one point said that Lynch's debut Eraserhead was his favorite film and he played it for the cast and crew of The Shining to set the mood.
The appreciation is mutual as Lynch has said multiple times that Kubrick is among his favorites, specifically the 1962 Nabokov adaptation Lolita.
I can see some similarities in the cinematography of Lynch and Kubrick, but this could be Lynch being inspired by Kubrick or them just having mutual influences.
The main way The Shining seems to relate to Eraserhead is in the experimental, evocative sound design. Lynch and Kubrick have similar tastes in music as a piece by Krzysztof Penderecki was used in both The Shining and Inland Empire, with Lynch again using the composer in Twin Peaks: The Return.
A connection can also be seen with Eraserhead in the 1979 Ridley Scott film Alien. H.R. Giger, the designer of the titular alien called Eraserhead one of the greatest films he'd ever seen. It's not hard to see the similarities between the Chestburster from Alien and the baby in Eraserhead, and of course both films have grotesque body horror elements.
The director of Requiem for a Dream and The Wrestler, Darren Aronofsky has likely been inspired by Lynch. The stark, grainy, black and white cinematography in his debut Pi is similar to Eraserhead and his use of dual identities in Black Swan could be connected to Mulholland Drive and Lost Highway.
The look of Eraserhead has also been said to have inspired avant-garde films like Tetsuo: The Iron Man and Begotten.
 |
| Tetsuo: The Iron Man |
Ana Lily Amirpour, the director of The Bad Batch and A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night said that she referenced Wild at Heart in the latter and that it's one of her favorite films.
With writing partner Mark Frost, Lynch has also profoundly changed the world of television with the original run of Twin Peaks, and time will tell if the 2017 revival will also leave its mark on the TV landscape.
Few shows have gotten more acclaim than HBO's The Sopranos and creator David Chase has explicitly stated that Twin Peaks was an influence, probably connected to Chase's frequent use of dream sequences.
An obvious example in serial television is Damon Lindelof, who was a showrunner on Lost and co-created The Leftovers. Lindelof was a frequent guest on an EW podcast dedicated to Twin Peaks and clearly knows the show well.
As far as Lost goes, Lindelof's partner was Carlton Cuse, who even admitted that for his show Bates Motel, they "pretty much ripped off Twin Peaks." Both Bates Motel and Twin Peaks are set in the Pacific Northwest and showcase the violent underbelly of small towns. Lindelof also said, "Lost would never have happened if Twin Peaks hadn’t occurred."
Lost and Twin Peaks both have huge casts and involve a location that mysterious, supernatural events seem to center around, and Jacob's cabin is reminiscent of the lodges in Twin Peaks. Lost is obviously much less experimental and is sort of a watered down version of Lynch and Frost's show, but both leave many questions unanswered.
Twin Peaks made it okay to show bizarre, surreal scenes on network television and it's difficult to imagine Lost having smoke monsters and polar bears on a tropical island without Twin Peaks paving the way.
Like Lost, Twin Peaks developed an obsessive cult following where fans analyzed every detail in attempts to solve mysteries.
The Leftovers is another show with supernatural elements from Lindelof and both it and Twin Peaks revolve around a central mystery and involve alternate realms of reality. Just as with Lost, Lindelof outright stated that The Leftovers wouldn't exist without Twin Peaks and that they tried to "do Lynch" in parts of season one.
Other shows claimed by critics to have been influenced by Twin Peaks include The X-Files, Mad Men, and 24.
A major way the show changed television is that before it, respected filmmakers weren't so closely involved with the making of a TV show. Now we see the best of the best work in television like Martin Scorsese with Boardwalk Empire, David Fincher with Mindhunter and House of Cards, and Steven Soderbergh with The Knick.
The Return is even more cinematic and auteur-driven as every single episode was directed by Lynch and written by him and Frost, and plots rarely resolve themselves over an individual episode. So it will be interesting to see if this leads to more works like this from acclaimed directors.
Television as a medium is widely considered to have been in a golden age for the past 10 or 15 years, and so many of the shows responsible for this have taken from Twin Peaks.
The first season was only 8 episodes and was much better received than the aimless second season. At that time and in the decades prior seasons were usually at least 20 episodes, but now it's not uncommon for many shows to have seasons of 8-13 episodes. This is especially true on streaming services and shows like this are often higher quality.
Twin Peaks was even parodied on The Simpsons with a scene from 1995 in "Who Shot Mr. Burns" that spoofs the backwards talking dream sequences.
The show was referenced on Sesame Street with a segment set in a town called "Twin Beaks" and Cookie Monster reporting back to a Diane.
Lynch's influence has been felt even in the world of video games, as many creators have mentioned him as an inspiration. The most well-known is Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima, one of the most important figures in gaming history.
Kojima tweeted about Twin Peaks back in 2014 in connection with his unfinished game PT, a demo that featured a time loop just like Lost Highway and a monstrous baby similar to the one in Eraserhead.
Twin Peaks has inspired or been referenced in dozens of games from all genres, including Zelda: Link's Awakening, Braid, Max Payne, Day of the Tentacle, and Alan Wake.
Lynch's influence extends to music as well as Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails said that Eraserhead inspired him. Reznor eventually worked on the soundtrack to Lost Highway and Nine Inch Nails performed at the Roadhouse in Twin Peaks: The Return.
The seminal alternative rock band Pixies recorded a much heavier cover of the song "In Heaven" from Eraserhead. Also, pop singer Lana Del Rey did a version of the title song from Blue Velvet. Musical artists that have used samples from Lynch's work include El-P, Frank Ocean, and DJ Shadow.
Paraxodically, Lynch has had a huge impact on media and art, and yet there aren't really many filmmakers making movies like his. Lynch's style is so idiosyncratic and personal and this makes it difficult for anyone to emulate his films.
No comments:
Post a Comment