Persistence Of Vision

 When I was in my twenties, David Lynch was already ninety. He was a codger long before he perhaps should have been, but this may explain why he passed away this past week at the age of ninety: The Power Of Weirdness. 

Hunter S. Thompson famously insisted that "when the going gets weird, the weird turn pro," and I can think of very few examples of this better than David Lynch. I am pleased and just a little bit smug to say that I "discovered" the films of David Lynch way back in the 1980's, after Eraserhead had achieved cult status. There were no theaters with midnight showings of Lynch's surreal dream movie, but home video allowed me to take the dare, of sorts, that was set out by those who had seen it before me. "See what you can make out of this."

It was an intensely odd ride through the black and white dreamscape of a film student who was supported by grants from the American Film Institute over the course of several years. During this sporadic period of filming, Lynch worked several odd jobs including delivering The Wall Street Journal while his nominal "star" Jack Nance kept that odd haircut for the duration. It may have been this dedication to his craft that first pushed my like button for David Lynch. 

Subsequently, I discovered his more "mainstream" work, including The Elephant Man, for which he was nominated an Academy Award for best director. No one was perhaps more bemused by this recognition than the movie's producer, Mel Brooks. Yes. That Mel Brooks. The success of that film seemed only to enthrall Hollywood all the more and they dropped him into the sci-fi epic Dune on his quirky reputation alone. 

That was a glorious mess. For most people, it was a mess that they didn't care to watch. But not me. Which is why I am so very glad that on Arrakis, Desert Planet, David discovered his muse for the next phase of his career. Starting with Blue Velvet, and continuing into the small screen fantasia of Twin Peaks, Kyle MacLachlan became David's onscreen avatar, probing the darkness out there in the netherworld. I ate this all up with a spoon. 

So great, in fact, was the impact of David Lynch's work that decades later my son found himself in a college course devoted to his oeuvre. Without prompting from his father, I might add. It made the weird part of my heart glad to hear that my son was as deeply affected by the passing of David Lynch as I was. To say that he stomped on the Terra would not be quite accurate, since I'm not sure how much time he actually spent on earth, but our planet will miss David Lynch. Weirdly enough.