David Lynch has died | Hacker News Reader

David Lynch has died

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"My childhood was elegant homes, tree-lined streets, the milkman, building backyard forts, droning airplanes, blue skies, picket fences, green grass, cherry trees. Middle America as it's supposed to be. But on the cherry tree there's this pitch oozing out – some black, some yellow, and millions of red ants crawling all over it. I discovered that if one looks a little closer at this beautiful world, there are always red ants underneath. Because I grew up in a perfect world, other things were a contrast."

David Lynch

Reminiscent of the opening scene of Blue Velvet.

I find it interesting how much Ebert hated that movie. I'm not sure how I feel about it myself, tbh, but I am certain I don't have his conviction to state it clearly and unambiguously. The film certainly made me feel things no other movie has.

I think if you're giving original opinions about movies it guarantees that you're going to be on the wrong side of history eventually. His reviews aren't any less interesting even when you disagree with him.

I'm not really convinced he's on "the wrong side"—we're entitled to strong opinions about the role of film in society and this is either value-oriented or subjective. But I emphatically do admire his willingness to stake his claim without ambiguity.

> His reviews aren't any less interesting even when you disagree with him.

100%

Agreed. I disagree pretty vehemently with him wrt Blue Velvet but he's one of the few reviewers I trust(ed)

I think Ebert didn't grasp what Lynch was going for with the Dorothy character, because I don't think anyone else in Hollywood was thinking like Lynch at the time.

Blue Velvet challenges you as a viewer to look at the abuse Dorothy suffers and to be a witness -- and that's hard to do as a viewer because it is ugly. Ebert did what a lot of people did and attempted to defend Isabella Rossellini, who had signed on to the movie knowing full well what would be required.

Lynch made two other movies in that same "the audience needs to bear witness and empathize" theme (Fire Walk With Me, Lost Highway) before Ebert caught on with Mulholland Dr.

I'm with Ebert, I hated it. Not because it wasn't effective. It was convincing, but such a bad experience I'll never watch it again.

But for the sound track. The scene where Kyle and Laura are in the car and she's talking about — what — birds? The scene, with that sound track, is so haunting.

EDIT: yeah, this scene: https://youtu.be/ncnq2pu4PlE

It certainly changes how you feel about listening to Mr sandman

The opposite of love isn't hate, it's indifference

Man I wonder if he knew what the neighbors got up to when their spouses were out of town.

he made Twin Peaks, he definitely knew

"I discovered that if one looks a little closer at this beautiful world, there are always red ants underneath." -- Well, he ain't just talking about literal ants...

I think he was talking about literal ants.

David Lynch’s work was never symbolic. You only ever got what was right in front of you.

The moment you start seeing symbols in his work, you know you’re viewing it wrong.

Edit: Lynch’s YT channel is filled with weather reports and random numbers. How much more anti-symbolic can you get?

"Did I ever tell you that this here jacket represents a symbol of my individuality and my belief in personal freedom?"

The snakeskin jacket was in the film on Nic Cage's request. Possibly that line too!

Lynch wrote that line because Nic wanted the jacket in the film. Gives it a little bit of an extra kick when you think about it.

He's elaborated on this and is not talking about ants

"What a heavy load Einstein must've had. Fuckin' morons, everywhere."

David Lynch

"On your fucking telephone. Get real!"

I have never seen a single one of his movies but I love watching interviews with him, he had an amazing presence and so much energy.

Start with "Eraserhead" and then go from there. Surreal is the word I associate with his movies and tv show (Twin Peaks) and I absolutely love watching such movies!

Dune or Twin Peaks are probably going to be more accessible than anything else.

For Eraserhead, I understand the metaphor of how parenting can be larger-than-life and terrifying and I see how Eraserhead was trying to embody that but I very much didn't appreciate the highly pessimistic ending. It's an early movie that would have benefited immensely from an alternate ending on its DVD.

The beauty of Lynch films is that everyone can interpret it in their own way!

I know what you're trying to say, but that's also true of every other movie.

Well Lynch famously said this over and over about his films — that they mean whatever people think they mean.

Watch a few interviews where he is asked what a film of his means. A smirk comes on his face and he repeats his mantra.

He never let on.

I'd argue many creators are this way. Nobody is ever going to approach a piece of art the same way.

Unless you are a narcissist (probable billionare) who feels the need to go back and explain every detail about the wizarding world you created a few decades later and reveal what kind of piece of crap you are.

sure but david lynch obviously lent into that way more than most others. his work is famously obtuse and the experience of each person watching and having that experience and interpreting it on their own was a huge part of the point of his work in a way that just isnt true for many other people

> you are a narcissist (probable billionare)

These days you'll have to be more specific.

No, there's far more room for interpretation than in a typical movie.

I think there's a lot more to Eraserhead than that! I also don't really see the ending as pessimistic personally.

Lynch: "Believe it or not, Eraserhead is my most spiritual film."

Lean: "Elaborate on that?"

Lynch: "No, I wont. No one sees it."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjoMEw2RYlA

The Straight Story is almost certainly his most accessible film, while also very focused on themes that he cares about.

It isn't the elusive puzzle that many cinephiles value in his work, but it is clearly a Lynch film, even if it's not a stereotypical one.

actually it is an elusive puzzle :D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wa16cd5zAuc&ab_channel=KyleL...

It also happens to be just a beautiful film.

His most mainstream work is The Elephant Man, commissioned by Mel Brooks.

The Elephant Man is great, but does have a surreal sequence, and is entirely in black and white. I'd vote for the The Straight Story, which is literally a Disney movie, being more mainstream.

> Surreal is the word I associate with his movies and tv show

And his style of surrealism has been so influential that it has its own term: Lynchian!

The "sausages" skit [1] by kids in the hall I'm pretty sure is massively inspired by eraserhead.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ChvxsVgT8c

Season 3 Twin Peaks is peak "I don't know what am I looking at".

When it first came out I was so desperate to see it I watched the first episode twice without realising.

I spent the whole time trying to work out what was different between the "two".

I mean, it’s exactly the sort of thing he would do and I still loved it.

Magic!

It's at least a third watching one of Kyle MacLachlan's characters walking around with brain damage.

I liked the season after a rewatch but the Dougie stuff is still tedious.

The Dougie stuff was silly fun. Cherry pie

It wasn't particularly entertaining and was well overdone.

    When people say "surreal" they mean "real", it's just most of your life is not very real, just repetition and routine. - Norm Macdonald

Eraserhead is borderline unwatchable. I love David Lynch, sort of, but without telling people that they're about to sit down and watch an hour-and-a-half of what is effectively an unwatchable piece of avant-garde cinema, then they're not going to be able to appreciate it.

There is nothing worse than getting excited to see a famous director's debut film, thinking you're going to have a good time, and then getting Eraserhead.

Eraserhead is highly watchable, but the first time you see it, it's best to just experience it without trying to process it too much. The nuance comes through on repeat viewings.

>Eraserhead is highly watchable

It is a film explicitly designed to be unpleasant. This may be artistically interesting, but it's certainly no going to appeal to most people.

I rented Eraserhead and watched with some friends in college. I loved it, and so did the other Lynch fan. The other two, well, the first words spoken over the credits were “What the actual fuck was that?” Let’s just say it’s a divisive film.

If someone is not into art films, to not start with Twin Peaks is absolutely insane to me.

First two seasons of Twin Peaks are his masterpiece IMO and his most watchable.

Those are some of the best characters of any film/tv show ever.

From there I would go to Lost Highway next for a stronger dose of the more out there stuff.

But he didn't direct all of Twin Peaks episodes and it shows.

i tried watching Twin Peaks but my GenZ attention-hungy brain got really bored during the first episode. maybe i should give it another shot...

it's not like i'm not used to watching long movies and i would call myself some form of cinephile, but for some reason Twin Peaks felt unbelievably slow.

Twin peaks is incredible and Agent Cooper is a kind of a role model haha, never seen any other character like him

maybe i should give it another shot...i'll at least finish the first episode :)

Yeah, it’s certainly one of those shows that take a couple episodes to settle in but then it’s one big, sweeping impression

Just start with the pilot first -- as it is, the US pilot is basically a feature-length film (it runs 1h25m), and features enough of Lynch's trademark juxtaposition of horrible and mundane, and piles on the warmth and love for his characters that set his works apart. The European cut of the pilot adds a few minutes to the end and originally aired as a TV movie, and may be worth it if you're not otherwise hooked by the show, since it features a definitive ending as well as the first appearance of the show's trademark "red room" (footage from the sequence was included in a later episode in the US).

For me, the second step would either be The Elephant Man or Mulholland Dr. -- many of his works tackle very dark subject matter and include sexualized violence that can be downright disturbing to watch, but those two omit those elements. The Straight Story is much lighter, but largely lacks the surrealism Lynch is known for.

Most of second season of TP wasn't really Lynch.

I'd personally say try Mulholland Drive first.

oh boy. I'd understand if you said to try Mullholland Drive first, second, and third and then go from there.

Yes this may be my favorite of his films, and I love pretty much everything he's done

Yes. Definitely his best.

I'd say twin peaks season 1 and first half of season 2 are Lynch's most accessible work

I'm gonna say start with Blue Velvet. It still has the backbone of a classical noir, but it is completely run through with the character of his work. Mulholland Drive reflects the apex of his vision and talents, but there's a learning curve to appreciating it.

Wild at heart. Very approachable, but gory and brutal. The angst seep trough

On the other end, save Inland Empire for after you've seen a lot of his filmography and are in the mood for a challenge.

I wouldn't call it his best work, but it is Lynch at his most singular and uncompromising.

I would put Twin Peaks: The Return up there too. Beneath the trademark surrealism and whimsy there’s an intense, bittersweet profoundness.

It was the last thing he made for TV/cinema and for me feels like the culmination of everything he did before it.

> Lynch at his most singular and uncompromising

More so than "Eraserhead"?

The Sekiro of Lynch movies. I was defeated by the first dance routine.

Nooooo, not Blue Velvet. That's on my "never watch again" list, because the people in it are so creepy I wanted to just go buy a million guns afterwards.

I feel the same. If Blue Velvet was the first Lynch movie I saw, I surely wouldn't have bothered with the rest, and I would have missed out on what I now consider one of my absolute favorites (Mulholland Drive). Same goes for Eraserhead and Wild at Heart.

Agree about "Blue Velvet" — too much Dennis Hopper, ha ha. Also agree the "Mulholland Drive" is a masterpiece.

It was my first, and I didn't bother with the rest.

There's just something in it that made me viscerally hate it, and I'm usually fond of surreal movies.

It's worth giving Mulholland Drive a look. And the Elephant Man and The Straight Story are nothing like Blue Velvet.

But it's also so beautiful; Laura Dern's character is so touching and Kyle McLachlan playing the naif in a world of evil is so moving.

And when they dance together at the end with "Mysteries of Love" playing - wow.

Literally just watched it today and it's definitely in my 10 least favorite movies I've ever watched. Wish I had seen your comment.

Mulholland Drive was my first Lynch movie and led me to watch pretty much everything else he released. I'd still start with Mulholland Drive if I started over again I think.

Other than the 1980's Dune movie he directed, I think it was either Lost Highway or Mulholland Drive that made me want to know more about David Lynch.

I had to watch Mulholland Drive at least 5 times to get a sense of what it's even about, and I think I must have been the audience for which he made that film, if it wasn't indeed just art to make himself happy (which is the BEST kind).

Anyway, it kind of endears another person to you when you connect with their work. So this one hit kind of hard.

I lost a fellow weirdo, and he'll be missed!

Elephant Man is perhaps the most approachable. Anthony Hopkins and John Hurt are at the apex of their acting careers in this film.

After that Mullholland Drive is absolutely brilliant and has that unforgettable masterpiece diner scene: https://youtu.be/UozhOo0Dt4o?si=GedzAdMh0KIXoHz4

Okay. not knowing anything about this film, not ever hearing or seeing it, I just clicked on that diner scene and holy f*ck, that was terrifying. and thank you :)

It's a jump scare that works incredibly well, yet it's shot in slow-motion and lit to full daylight, two things anathema to jump scares.

I would say that A Straight Story is even more approachable.

If you didn't know it was by Lynch you would never suspect it.

The lipstick scene. There should be an emoji for that.

I'm also ashamed to say I've also never seen any of his movies and TV series but this still hits hard because of his influence on some my most cherished fictional properties. These are Alan Wake/Control, Silent Hill 1&2, Returnal and Disco Elysium.

Actually, his influence on how surrealist fiction is presented throughout all media cannot be understated. I was surprised to read even the original Zelda has him as an influence. Majora's Mask does feel particularly Lynchian.

It would not surprise me if the Souls games and at least the later Berserks (late 90s/early 2000s forward) were either directly or 1-step indirectly influenced by Lynch.

I think it was less the original Zelda than it was Link's Awakening that had the Lynch influence, specifically influence by Twin Peaks

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2019/12/feature_how_david_...

There's no possibility Lynch inspired the original Zelda.

The original Zelda was released way before Lynch's Twin Peaks, which was a hit in Japan, was even in production. The look of the protagonist of Zelda was inspired by Disney's Peter Pan. The pig villain was inspired by a pig man in Journey to the West.

It was the fourth Zelda, Link’s Awakening (1993), that was inspired by Lynch and Twin Peaks. If you’ve played it, the influence in that one is apparent — it’s about Link discovering an isolated community of eccentrics hiding a secret, and dreams play a major role. The game’s director, Takashi Tezuka, specifically wanted to emulate the mood of Dale Cooper discovering the town of Twin Peaks, meeting its oddball inhabitants, and trying to figure out what they’re hiding.

An (un)obvious connection between Eraserhead and Bloodborne (spoiler!):

https://www.reddit.com/r/bloodborne/comments/xgu21c/eraserhe...

Gentle intro: Rabbits, on youtube.

Also on YouTube: "David Lynch Cooks Quinoa". It's a short film that is both nothing like his films/TV and everything like his films/TV. It's that "cooking podcast" or "recipe blog" that's a meandering journey through life and maybe has some bon mots about living, but also includes a recipe because it does. Like watching a beloved elderly relative do something normal in the kitchen, but also moody and in black and white.

I loved that short film. I showed it to my wife and she said "That's 20 minutes of my life I'm never getting back."

How does it compare to the salad preparation scene in Eraserhead?

If you only watch one, I think Fire Walk With Me is the most representative. If you like it, there's a lot more to explore. If not, then maybe Lynch isn't your thing.

Great movie, but I'm not sure I would've enjoyed it as much if I hadn't already watched Twin Peaks.

I think that "fire walk with me" poem is so clunky I've refused to watch anything he's ever made.

Look, I love FWWM, but that's a brutal way to start. Firstly, it works a lot better if you know TP. Secondly... it's a brutal film. I've seen it a bunch of times and still find some of it hard to watch.

It was panned when it came out (and still inspires downvoting?? not exactly an objective convo here folks) but since then FWWM has gained tons more appreciation.

Family sexual abuse survivors in particular have lauded the movie. It's really DL's most serious treatment of an issue (but makes it harder to watch too).

Can recommend the documentary "David Lynch, The Art Life". For now appears to be here:

https://youtu.be/a6slh83RhfA

(Sorry — it appears to be 360p, not very hi-res. Other higher res versions can be found but with subtitles or dubbed in... maybe Farsi?)

Whether you've seen his movies or not, this 35 second video clip is David Lynch gold ("David Lynch on product placement"):

https://youtu.be/F4wh_mc8hRE?si=SJwtz31ZEWuW9rk7

(Has swearing off that matters for your use!) Rest in peace.

Surprised nobody has mentioned Lost Highway - to me it is the perfect film.

Lost Highway doesn't get the love for some reason. It's got all the DL hits and some of the best cinematography in his oeuvre. The coffee table is peak DL head wound

Mmm not a great quote..

Ha, I kind of agree with you, and I'm a little embarrassed it's as upvoted as it is. I just love the silly little video of him saying it and then cracking up. It pops into my head a lot and gives me a laugh. I just felt like sharing it to be goofy. Didn't imagine it would end up at the top of the thread!

the brighter the light, the deeper the shadows

Wish he had a bill burr rant or asmr to sleep channel. There is not enough public recordings of lynch talking.

You could merge his daily weather updates into a long rambling video.

Like this? https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bL6fLdOK_FM

What people to have. Those who think outside, see different, appreciate else.

What interview did he say this in? Would love to watch it! ant colonies popped up a while back on HN as being an exemplary life form

During Covid I started watching his daily weather update, even though I didn’t live in LA. Virtually every day was the same. Very clear. Very still.

I’m not sure if anyone could ever “get” one of his movies completely beyond the experience and the narrative. He always left so much unsaid and open to interpretation, just like life. They are movies designed to make the viewer feel a certain way, rather than literally what’s in the screen. He was one of the few directors that I thought of as making weird things that I would enjoy (most of the time), but how could anyone else?

“I like to remember things my own way. How I remembered them, not necessarily the way they happened.”

It took me a little while to be convinced that he was actually reporting the weather as it was like at his home rather than saying the same thing every day. But, no, he was really reporting the weather and the weather is really just always like that in LA.

"Los Angeles, every day, hot and sunny, today, hot and sunny, tomorrow, hot and, for the rest of the… hot and sunny, every single day, hot and sunny. And they love it. 'Isn’t great, every day, hot and sunny?' What are you, a @$%^& lizard?"

- Bill Hicks

I've been in LA for 14 years, and I always say LA has great weather in the same way a mall has good weather. It's never unpleasant and is always "perfect", but at some point you miss the feeling of breeze and slight variations and it feels like you're breathing air from a can.

I’m in Seattle and during the summer heat, the city dries and sometimes ends up with smokey haze from wildfires.

Then comes that random rainy day at the end of the heatwave, gives the city a shower it needs and the fresh smell is unbeatable.

I’m not sure what heaven smells like, but if I had to guess it’s like the air after summer rain in my city.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petrichor

Pleasantly surprised there are candles with this scent. I’ll have to try a few.

I mean we get wind. But that usually comes right before fire.

Hah yeah plus it always feels sinister. We don't get nice breezes.

That is funny, when I see David I see Bill and vice versa.

I was also under the impression that sometimes his weather report was more like a him stating how he was feeling that morning

LA weather is either "coastal low clouds will burn off by late morning, it'll be a lovely day", StormWatch(TM), or Santa Ana winds.

There's no other options :P

Reminds me of his comic strip. Same pictures every time, just different words.

> I’m not sure if anyone could ever “get” one of his movies completely beyond the experience and the narrative.

His movies are not supposed to be "got" completely. They are surrealist. They have the logic of dreams. Or nightmares. There are things in them that won't ever make literal sense.

Any film school graduate can string together some random images and call it "surreal", and mostly those would be boring. but Lynch was a master: in his films, all too often, just as your conscious mind was going "wait, what?" some subconscious voice would be nodding "yes, that fits".

I want to push back on the surreal end slightly. It's true that his movies are extremely resistant to analysis, and it's true that much of his imagery is de-facto surreal. But his movies still have narratives assembled from humans in concrete situations with concrete problems and easily understandable actions and reactions. In other words, you can enjoy his movies as an experience at relative face-value in a way many other forms of surreal art resist.

Some more than others, perhaps—the man produced Dune and Eraserhead pretty damn close together, and Eraserhead is not generally considered an easy movie to watch. But the man was never afraid or dismissive of giving us straightforwardly enjoyable cinema, even if we can't easily articulate why!

Sort of. The plot is not always clear, but what is always clear is how you are supposed to feel in each scene.

Yes! I tell people to focus on the emotions that come up when they watch his stuff, and to focus less on trying to piece everything together.

Eraserhead is about the fear of being a new father.

As a father that was much more obvious than when I saw it for the first time at 16 ;-)

Perhaps more to the point, the fear that parenthood will destroy "the art life".

> I’m not sure if anyone could ever “get” one of his movies completely beyond the experience and the narrative.

The plots of his movies are often more concrete than people expect. I'm not saying a movie like Mulholland Drive is easy to follow, but it does have a legible plot. Feel free to read the wiki or something if you are not sure who some character is or what they are doing.

If you are just letting the experience wash over you, you may be missing some plot points that are not meant to be mysterious.

Obviously his movies are weird and not entirely legible, but don't assume everything in them is meant to be inscrutable.

I wasn’t implying that there was no narrative, just that his movies were so much more than just the narrative. And often things that seemed perplexing were just things he thought were interesting or beautiful so he put them there for no other reason.

That’s, in my opinion, where some of the intractability comes from: is this bug buzzing around a ceiling light meaningful to the plot or just something he saw one day and wanted others to experience as well. Every once in a while he’d give a tell, often unintentionally, while talking about something else. But most of the time he let things into the world without explanation.

Mulholland drives plot isn’t even that hard to follow once you figure out the twist. You can definitely go crazy deep with the symbolism though

All of the comments about how hard Mullholland Drive was to follow are making me wonder if I missed something. I watched it a couple of times when it was in the theater and enjoyed it, but I don't remember being all that confused. Certainly not like Twin Peaks confused. I guess now is as good a time as any to rewatch it.

in my experience, this is just a very individual thing, warying from person to person. i watch a lot of movies on my own, and when i watch movies with others, i'm sometimes very surprised how much troube some people have understanding a movie.

i mean, Inception is one of those movies which is a tiny bit more difficult to understand, but i've watched it with people who had zero clue what was going on.

enough trashing other people - i loved watching Memento, but i must confess that i should watch it again, as i didn't really understand the full story while watching it.

then there are movies like tenet which just feel complicated as a gimmick, reminding me of the rick&morty copypasta, "To Be Fair, You Have To Have a Very High IQ to Understand X"

in summary, some people are good with abstract thinking and understanding, others are not.

> I’m not sure if anyone could ever “get” one of his movies completely beyond the experience and the narrative.

I actually found "Mulholland Drive" to be incredibly accessible for a Lynch movie. Twin Peaks remains an absolute (and highly fascinating) enigma to me, especially the third season, but "Mulholland Drive" always felt like an enigma with a satisfying solution.

He used to do those on the LA radio station Indie 103. He would call into Joe Escalante’s morning show and do the weather.

During the pandemic David Lynch released a daily weather video in which he reported what the weather was at his home in Los Angeles.

First video was May 11, 2020: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krIj6eLF4mU

Last video was December 16, 2022: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l21GFyOO8Ug

He also released a daily video in which he drew a bingo number. I can't really imagine any other major director doing something like that in their late 70s.

I also liked his interview project: https://youtube.com/@davidlynchpresentsIP

Actually he started this back in 2005

As part of his pre-YouTube digital media website along other works like Rabbits

HIs final video was sent to his foundation's fundraiser last year because he couldn't attend:

https://www.reddit.com/r/davidlynch/comments/1fg3npu/david_l...

These were the very last words he spoke:

______

May everyone be happy.

May everyone be free of disease.

May auspiciousness be seen everywhere.

May suffering belong to no-one.

Peace.

Jai guru dev

________

I'm so grateful he was able to make Twin Peaks: The Return before he passed. It's one of the most brilliant and moving pieces of fiction I've ever experienced. If they had started it just a few years later it may have never been finished.

Some of the people who returned for it died not long after it wrapped. The "Log Lady" might have died before it wrapped, even, can't recall. Miguel Ferrer wasn't around much longer. Even with Lynch living a good while past it, it'd have been far more limited production if it'd started even a couple years after it did. They already had to do without Bowie and a few others that it seems Lynch might have liked to use (given what he did with the season), like Frank Silva (BOB) of course, and notably Don Davis (Major Garland Briggs).

Wow, what a great point. The Return actually being created is a miracle in so many ways.

And the fact that it actually was released 25 years after Laura said "I'll see you in 25 years"? I'm not a spiritual person, but it does feel like the universe wanted that show to be made!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BL57-9171pk

> The "Log Lady" might have died before it wrapped

Yes, she was terminally ill and in hospice care. Lynch moved up the filming of her scenes as well as writing the part so she wouldn't need to travel. The fans really embraced her in the years after the original show aired, inviting her to conventions, etc. She wanted to finish her character's role for the fans before she died.

It was heart-wrenching to watch those scenes. You never knew whether it was the last episode you'd see her.

Yes, I came here just to post this. I loved Twin Peaks and was devastated when it was canceled after the second season. It was just too deep and cerebral for early 90s prime time TV. But I somehow never even heard about Twin Peaks: The Return in 2018 because it was only on Showtime and I was busy with life stuff at the time.

Discovering it existed and watching it a couple years ago was such an awesome experience.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twin_Peaks_season_3

Like most reboots/long awaited sequels I was very skeptical of it and it absolutely blew my mind. It's one of the most beautifully shot and hallucinatory TV series I've ever seen. I think it's his best work.

It has always been on my list, but I haven't watched it yet. Thanks for the reminder!

Return was a phenomenal mix of things. It didn’t match the vibe of the original too often, and when it did it was probably weaker. But overall? Some of the best television.

The Mitchum (sp?) brothers arc evokes so much joy it’s just hilarious.

As pretentious as it may sound, The Return is both my favourite movie and my favourite TV show of the past 25 years.

Lynch said explicitly that it was best understood as a movie in 25 parts, if I recall correctly.

A bunch of professional critics put it on their best "movies" of the year lists at the time

I literally just finished The Return two days ago, because the Blank Check Podcast, a very long form podcast about filmographies that I love, is covering Lynch.

The fact that The Return exists at all is amazing. The fact that it is not what you expected or wanted is really compelling. I absolutely loved it, even if I honestly have no idea what much of it means. Lynch's ability to use pacing -- lingering on a scene -- to cause unease is really something special.

https://www.blankcheckpod.com/

> or wanted

I forget if this is something Lynch ever explicitly talked about, but the way he pulled this off was masterful. We’re in an era of franchises, sequels, and reboots, and all a lot of people wanted from The Return was more Dale Cooper being Dale Cooper. And we get what, maybe 15 minutes of that out of 15 hours? Yet it’s one of the best seasons of television I’ve ever seen.

I finished that show with such mixed emotions. Dismay at the lack of closure. Foolishness for ever thinking that a Lynch production would provide anything approaching closure. But after letting things settle, it was the perfect ending.

Watching it as it aired, fans of the show were SO mixed on their opinions. Many people were so upset that we get very little OG Dale Cooper and so little closure on so many things.

But it couldn't have gone any other way. The director that gave us "how's Annie? how's Annie?!" approaching it any other way would have not been genuine.

I hate season 3 so much. I don't even consider it part of the story.

The greatest ending ever to a TV show is the end of season 2. Nothing can ever touch that as an ending. Season 3 was not needed but I am just glad I got to watch the show when it aired originally.

That ending in 1991 on prime time network TV next to corny sitcoms is just so out of time. Like a transmission from another dimension.

> Season 3 was not needed

I disagree! I consider it Lynch's best work.

Interesting you liked the ending of Season 2. About 1/3 of the way through, Lynch distanced himself from the series and stopped directing it. He stated that he caved to network pressure to resolve the murder early and combined with actor off and on-set drama, it derailed his plans for the second season. Mark Frost took over as the de facto show runner, but without that partnership, he just basically babysat it until the show was killed off.

I still enjoyed the season, but arguably, it's the most un-Lynchian.

Lynch came back and directed the final episode! That's why it feels like such a departure from the rest of the season. It feels like season 1, and season 3, whereas the rest of season 2 was this weird soap opera.

> Season 3 was not needed

The compelling thing here is that Lynch disagreed with you.

Season 3 is so great it easily eclipses the first two, despite my pretty strong nostalgia-bias. It's like the first two were just a warm-up - and we needed the 25 years just to prepare ourselves for what he really wanted to do.

David Lynch has been my favorite director and one of my favorite people for most of my life. His work and outlook has influenced almost everything I've ever created. He changed the way I saw the world for better. I'm really sincerely going to miss what he brought to the world

What he brought to the world isn't leaving. What he could have brought will never be experienced though.

I am going to miss him. Not only his art but his personality.

We need that kind of crazy.

Absolutely. He's my favourite artist, and for me no one else comes close. R.I.P Mr. Lynch.

Same here.

Julee Cruise/Lynch/Badalamenti - Floating into the Night album is really fitting music for right now.

Into the Night https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsLJxUEbkG8

The late David Foster Wallace said one of the only directors he found interesting was David Lynch.

https://youtu.be/C0Cvtu2FfGw?si=1_wk8fPMeeHYLrxl

I love that DFW wrote an essay about Lost Highway and used the term “Lynchian” (something horrific sitting right next to something mundane in a scene).

Charlie Rose asked Lynch about the phrase and didn’t really know how to respond.

Rose then brings this up with DFW who kinda chuckles and implies that was what he would expect.

Two extremely talented and intelligent creatives, but where DFW cared quite a bit how he was perceived, I don’t think Lynch ever gave a shit.

Lynch was on another plane of creativity and I’m not sure he even really knew it. He just did what he wanted to do (except for the original Dune film…)and let people take away from it what they might.

I honestly cant say I “enjoy” Lynch films but I will be the first to admit there is heart and soul poured into them by a genius.

Here's a non-facebook link for anyone who refuses to use that site:

https://variety.com/2025/film/news/david-lynch-dead-director...

Thank you. I was hesitating to post the facebook source but back when I submitted there was no other coverage.

HN guidelines prefer the original source when possible, so you did the right thing IMHO.

Apparently not! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42729717

Funny :)

Oh damn haha, a good example I suppose that "guidelines" aren't meant to be hard rules :-)

Also on The Grauniad

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/jan/16/david-lynch-twi...

Ok, we'll use that above, since it has so much more information. (Submitted url was https://www.facebook.com/davidlynchofficial/posts/it-is-with....)

Another relevant link people may want to look at:

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/david-ly...

Looks like NYT haven't published their full obituary yet.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42730000

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/16/movies/david-lynch-dead.h...

https://archive.today/NAhZi

At the bottom of the last link it says "a full obituary will be published soon". But it seems they've done so now: https://archive.ph/vyxDJ.

My apologies for the lack of completeness at the time of my comment.

Oh man! that's depressing... I always remember the appearances he made on "Louie", as a talent agent... He was so funny, I choose to believe that he wasn't acting at all. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlEJbs02wAM

Oh! Thanks for reminding me why his face is so familiar.

(I’m not someone who knows anything about film…)

He saved a lot of great dialog for himself: "I told all your colleagues, those clown comics, to fix their hearts or die".

RIP.

That this was specifically about telling transphobes to knock it off feels very relevant in the current moment.

Sad news, he was a genius creator - I like to think about him as Salvador Dali of our times. For sure his works will be remembered.

Having just read Lynch's Catching Big Fish, two quotes stood out to me:

"There's safety in thinking in a diner. You can have your coffee or your milk shake, and you can go off into strange dark areas, and always come back to the safety of the diner. "

"The light can make all the difference in a film, even in a character. I love seeing people come out of darkness."

What an interesting man. RIP.

How sad. Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive (the IMO under-appreciated pilot), and yes his Dune even though he didn't like it are some of my favourite movies of all time. RIP

100% for his Dune

Hopefully it will get reappraised, now

One of the most brilliant failures of move history

Blue Velvet and Elephant Man. Discover them or help someone else discover them.

Of course I know them (actually watched Elephant Man as a kid on the big screen!). Lost Highway and Mulholland Drive just sting harder as unspeakable reflection on who we pretend to be to ourselves vs how we might look in the eyes of a cruel society IMO if my interpretation isn't totally nuts. I think I'm going to watch MD right now in memoriam!

We discovered a cut that was about three hours that people who hadn’t read the book seemed to understand. Had a different intro and flowed better.

I’ve seen three versions of this movie. The theatrical and the longest one both sucked for anyone not a Herbert fan. I thought the longest was the director’s cut but he never did one. Perhaps it was the TV movie cut. But I don’t know what the “good” one was called.

My best guess is that you're thinking of the Spicediver edit, a fan edit which runs about three hours, and is highly regarded.

https://www.phind.com/search?cache=mrvch82ai4szf4ulx1c98eqt

Thanks for this, now I've got a nice movie night plan.

> AI-upscaled to 4K resolution

oh man i can already hear the cinephiles crying.

Do you know when this was made? The version I am thinking of existed at least as early as 1995, possibly 1993. Someone else hosted us so that removes a lot of the clues I would normally use to figure out when exactly it happened.

This page on IMDB has all the "legitimate" versions I'm aware of, but I'm sure there are unauthorized cuts out there:

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087182/alternateversions/

A non-theatrical "director's cut" is a Mandela Effect moment for me. I don't know what I watched. It wasn't the TV version, because that was the first version I watched. I can only guess that it was a common mistake to call some version "the director's cut" among viewers (or maybe just my friends) in the past.

The list I've linked to certainly wasn't illuminating for me, but maybe it will be for you.

Interesting. I understand he wasn't satisfied with the introductory narrative and other non-cinematic means of storytelling. But I love how the movie focuses on inner dialog to approach the novel and how decidedly non-techie, for sci-fi of all things, the movie was at the time, believably telling the story of a post-tech society that had room for style and decadence. And the Dune remake pays tribute to it.

I was also in awe how time travel was depicted by music; might help that the cheesy guild navigator scene operating the spacecraft wasn't shown (or was it? I didn't notice it when I first viewed it, and I like to think that's one of those scenes David Lynch would've rather left out).

I camped out in line on Hollywood Blvd for several hours to be in the first public screening of Dune at the Chinese Theater. So I know I saw the release print and to my then college-aged perceptions, I didn't really connect with it. I didn't think it was bad but I didn't think it was good either.

I blame this on the muddled mess that was the release edit and how misleadingly the film was promoted by the studio. I was a huge fan of pop sci-fi like Star Wars, Alien and Blade Runner and the advertising set a very different audience expectation than what the film delivered. Unfortunately, that experience kind of tainted Lynch's Dune for me.

I didn't really begin to appreciate Lynch as a great filmmaker until Blue Velvet and Twin Peaks, both of which I loved. Someone linked a 'highly-regarded' three hour fan edit of Lynch's Dune which I've bookmarked to check out.

> and yes his Dune even though he didn't like it

His Dune was the only one close to the book and the atmosphere of the book.

Rest in peace to a one-of-a-kind creative genius. Strangely I just rewatched Inland Empire last night for the first time since seeing it in the theater, so this is hitting extra hard.

In addition to his incredible film/television work, I'd like to give a shout-out to his other forms of artistic expression which often got less attention. His musical output captured the same unique vibe as his films, for example his album Crazy Clown Time is almost certainly best enjoyed in a smoky room with syncopated strobe lights and patterned flooring. His mixed-media paintings and sculpture were also impressively unsettling.

For Lynch his most important work was promoting his foundation

Here's a nationally televised discussion he had with the President of Ukraine about teaching 100,000 veterans to meditate:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xf7-mErKWlc

His final public appearance was a video he sent to a fundraiser for his foundation last year:

https://www.reddit.com/r/davidlynch/comments/1fg3npu/david_l...

______

* May everyone be happy.

May everyone be free of disease.

May auspiciousness be seen everywhere.

May suffering belong to no-one.

Peace.

Jai guru dev

________

This video of Angelo Badalamenti explaining how they came up with Laura Palmer's theme is a neat little look into his creativity.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-eqgr_gn4k

Love Twin Peaks. Puget Sound resident here. I can see the big driftwood log Laura Palmer was found next to from my window.

Twin Peaks was delightfully weird. It was the sole reason I bought a TV, believe it or not.

Another nice thing about Twin Peaks is it inspired Chris Carter's X-files and the early X-files seasons have that same dreary feel to them Twin Peaks did.

X-Files was another amazing show. A must-watch for my kids, when they come of age for it.

Aside from, obviously, David Duchovny, more than a handful of the regular Twin Peaks cast showed up in the X Files. Shapes ft. Michael Horse and Humbug ft. Michael J. Anderson are two particularly great early episodes.

Don S. Davis played Maj. Garland Briggs in Twin Peaks and Captain William Scully, Dana Scully's father in the X-files first season (and in one or two later cameos). In both he plays a stuffy high ranking military officer which is quite amusing.

RIP Don S. Davis, aka 90 TV's best military dad.

I made the pilgrimage to Snoqualmie and North Bend multiple times. David Lynch has always been my inspiration.

A lot of beautiful scenery, and the locations themselves are like characters in the show.

I'm incredibly saddened by his passing away, even if it was expected given the recent decline of his health.

I'm not going to touch on his films, which are all special and definitely worth watching, but if anyone who didn't know him wants a primer on his complex, sometimes surreal, but I think ultimately endearing personality, then this is a nice introduction:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqZpi8zAqe0

He knew he was about to die. He sent this to his Foundation's fundraiser last year:

https://www.reddit.com/r/davidlynch/comments/1fg3npu/david_l...

His last words were: ______

* May everyone be happy.

May everyone be free of disease.

May auspiciousness be seen everywhere.

May suffering belong to no-one.

Peace.

Jai guru dev

________

I have enjoyed pretty much all of David Lynch's work. A particular standout for me is episode 8 of Twin Peaks season 3, titled "Got a Light?" - for my money the greatest TV episode ever, an incredible high cultural landmark. In one breathtaking sequence David Lynch uses Krzysztof Penderecki's "Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima", which depicts the Trinity atomic bomb test. The piece, composed in 1961 for 52 string instruments, mirrors the destruction and chaos of the atomic bomb detonation. Lynch used the composition during the startling sequence tracking into the heart of the nuclear test's mushroom cloud. https://youtu.be/vYg8nos8SdA?feature=shared

+1 This scene was so moving. Seeing it for the first time floored me.

Somedays I long for a world where everyone has a touch more of the mad creativity he had.

Perhaps we do and we just need to nurture it more.

Also the Mr Plow-ish of all playstation advertisements.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Laf9vpJMDjA

Good lord. He put a bunch of things in that that he'd use in Twin Peaks: The Return. Wild.

Mulholland Drive is one of my all-time favorites. A genius director!

Same.

Yes for me it's a tie between Mulholland Drive and Lost Highway. I also prefer Mulholland drive.

The news makes me sad, I feel like I've lost a friend, even though I never met Lynch.

My favorite is Lost Highway. And here's what I think it is "about": unbearable remorse.

Lynch's ability to make the most unnerving scenes I've ever seen was incredible. And he ostensibly wasn't even making horror movies. Something about this scene (and so many others): triggers something deep in my soul: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZowK0NAvig

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKd2YldRvB8

Regardless of how his films come together as a whole, Lynch is without a doubt the most prolific producer of haunting and unforgettable imagery that inhabits my mind. A few months ago I rewatched, on Youtube a scene from the Elephant Man, a film I saw once 30 years ago. The scene was just like I remember it, I only to watch it that one time and it was etched into my mind forever, crystalline.

Dune is more fun to watch and seems to have emerged as my all-time favorite film. In spite of it's flaws and Lynch's own disdain for it, the orphaned film is no less visionary, and is as strikingly original as anything Lynch has made.

> Dune is more fun to watch and seems to have emerged as my all-time favorite film. In spite of it's flaws and Lynch's own disdain for it, the orphaned film is no less visionary, and is as strikingly original as anything Lynch has made.

I don't get all the disdain for his Dune. For its time, I found it quite entertaining. The scene of the menacing black tank containing the guild navigator emerging out of fumes at the emperor's court will stay with me. Obviously it can't compare in terms of effects or the subtleties of the latest version but it was impressive nevertheless. Without his version, I wouldn't even have known about Dune.

Not without its issues but it also prominently featured the mentats, which the recent version didn't.

Good point. Same with guild navigators - the whole point of the bickering is spice and the whole point of spice is navigation. I get the DV's less-is-more aesthetic but these were deep and exciting subjects that weren't explored much.

Just when his work seemed like it was about to come back around and start to make sense, he would throw you for another loop that was the furthest thing from making any sense- and as a result could consistently create a set of childlike wonder, curiosity, and awe that are rarely experienced by adults nowadays.

Like a zen koan, the unexplainably of it could consistently shock the viewer back into experiencing the entire breadth of human emotion and experience that is outside of rational understanding.

David Lynch's work was mind blowingly creative and original work in a sea of boring media made by committees trying to extract a little more profit from the same few banal formulas over and over.

I'm shocked and grateful he was able to fund and produce things that were so weird and fascinating. The owls are not what they seem.

I’ve slowly become aware, over time, that David Lynch and David Bowie seemed to be the social bridge that was secretly connecting all of the artists I like across seemingly every medium. Like an erdos number for these two davids that seemed to drive good outcomes

RIP to a legend. I remember renting the world's worst quality VHS tapes of Twin Peaks before the DVD remaster came out, but loving every second of it (excluding the James and Donna duet of course). Coincidentally, I'm on a road trip across the state and made plans to stop at Tweede's for lunch.

Eraserhead - my mind is still trying to make sense of it

Believe it or not, it was his most spiritual film.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjoMEw2RYlA

====

Host: "Elaborate on that..."

David Lynch: "No, I won't." [Host and audience laughs]

====

Gee - that creates even more questions.

[edit]

Here's the start of the Eraserhead portion of the interview - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpomrL0qA-E&t=372s

"Fear and anguish of parenthood" as a movie?

He said something like, in speaking with a therapist, ”if i get therapy, is there a risk i’ll lose my creativity?”, and she said ”yes”. So he didn’t take it if i recall, and did this transcendental meditation thing instead. That’s someone who loves his art.

100%. As he's described it himself, he was certainly dedicated to the art life.

This video of him raging against the corporate machine, really humanizes him here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5kaMQCbKn4

I was relaxing with my family in the living room this evening, and suddenly I heard familiar trance-like guitar sounds from the kitchen radio. I listened for a few seconds, then my wife heard it, and said, "ah, Twin Peaks". We all listened quietly for a while to Falling by Julee Cruise, and I wondered why a mainstream radio station would play this song.

Now I know why.

David Lynch was a giant in film directing with his unique vision and surreal style and he gave us so many great movies. But more importantly I feel that he inspired so many modern movie directors such as Ari Aster and Yorgos Lanthimos to make movies like that. I put Lynch in the same category of greatness as Kubrick and Tarkovsky. True genius!

Lynch anecdote (you can find it on YouTube). Kubrick invited some movie people to see his favorite film (no qualifiers) 'Eraserhead'

Lynch's was still my favorite version of Dune despite flaws.

Yep, no contest. Compared to the sterile, boring, brooding Villeneuve version - a tone that worked well in Blade Runner 2049 however - it's so much more entertaining and interesting.

I liked the first one from Villeneuve because for the most part it stuck to the story but the second one veered off into its own story.

I know its nerdy but I absolutely hate when movies of classic books think the story needs to be changed (I'm looking at you, Peter Jackson).

I'm still reserving judgement.

In a vacuum I don't love the changes he made to Part 2 but I can also see how they will make it flow much better into Part 3 than Dune > Dune Messiah ever did (that always felt disjointed to me); as well as make that story more compelling.

I wish just for once these directors had simply made the movie of the book and damn the consequences of what Hollywood thinks audiences want. The movies that directors such as Peter Jackson make are brilliantly done - if only the story wasn't hacked. And that's not even addressing the worst of the travesties such as Radagast the Brown being covered in bird shit and the dwarves in The Hobbit being a bunch of circus clowns.

Its often not directors defining pacing and length of the result, but producer/studio. A lot of bitter conflicts came up from this.

This is the the most famous, if not the only instance of Lynch giving up control of the final edit. He seemed angry about the way it turned out.

That's why the director is listed as "Alan Smithee"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Smithee

"Alan Smithee (also Allen Smithee) is an official pseudonym used by film directors who wish to disown a project."

Yeah. He seemed pretty torn up about it. I believe he said he “died a death” over it.

Here’s more into for anyone interested.

https://www.cinedump.com/reviews/2021/6/3/dune-alan-smithee-...

What works in books often doesn't work on screen and vice versa. They are different media.

Agreed. The difference between a book and a film is that they are completely different things. You can't just graft a story from one directly onto another and expect results.

> What works in books often doesn't work on screen and vice versa. They are different media.

Not really. The biggest issue is time. As far as i noticed, one needs 2 hours of movie for 100 pages of a book. Anything below this (fitting 400 pages in 2 hours) is art. That's why Lynch's version is better.

Exactly

For example, 2001 was a great movie but Clarke's worst book imo because he collaborated with Kubrick to write it for for big screen.

It's not about what they "think audience want" it's about what film directors know works for visual storytelling as opposed to written storytelling.

I've tried to avoid spoilers below, but there are some minor ones for anyone reading who has never read Dune Messiah.

I've read Dune at least a dozen times and followed up with Dune Messiah a few times. Sometimes I get that feeling of disjointedness. At its most extreme, Paul feels like a total stranger. (Stilgar might as well be a different characters; we see a changed character, but not the change.) Sometimes it feels like the books flows nicely despite the time jump. My best guess is that it depends on what aspects I've been most focused on while reading.

I'm reserving judgment as well, but one part is really stuck in my craw. Although I felt like Villeneuve's Chani was generally stronger I felt the last scene made her look like a child and my first thought was that it was a weak attempt to set up a particular relationship for Part 3.

> but I can also see how they will make it flow much better into Part 3 than Dune > Dune Messiah

Lynch could have made a Dune Messiah. Villeneuve is not able to express the mysticism.

I appreciated the change to make Chani fill a role like Sherif Ali in the film Lawrence Of Arabia (the book Seven Pillars of Wisdom, if not the film, is plainly a huge influence on Herbert's Dune, and it's probably impossible for a director to film so much as a scene set in the desert without thinking of Lean's film).

So much of Dune takes place inside people's heads that it's basically unfilmable if you don't make some changes. Plus, even with five hours of film, you're going to be cutting whole scenes from the book whether you want to or not. Lynch's solution was to make it a more straightforward hero's journey—and given the length of his film, and no expectation of sequels, I can't really blame him. Villeneuve had more space and so could tell a darker and more foreboding story, closer to the original, but still needed to externalize some of that internal struggle and foreshadowing, for which he used, especially, Chani.

[EDIT] Oh and as for this:

> I know its nerdy but I absolutely hate when movies of classic books think the story needs to be changed

Every now and then such a deviation ends up being excellent as its own way, while still benefitting from the connection to the original and being better as an "adaptation" than an independent property. Verhoeven's Starship Troopers would be one of the more extreme examples of this kind of outcome. A gentler one might be Kubrick's The Shining.

Good adaptation is inherently transformative, despite nerd disgruntlement.

Perhaps in a few years AI will have progressed to the point people can spin up their own literal version and see this for themselves.

Lynch had the cojones to show a guild navigator

Just be sure to watch the longer, two-parts version; it's bewildering how much the ending was butchered, and changed, in the theatrical one

They re-released it in theaters when the new Dune came out. I was one of four people at my viewing!

I thought I was the only one who preferred David Lynch's Dune. I'm glad to find out I'm not alone. I explain to people that it depends on if you're a bigger David Lynch fan or a Frank Herbert fan. I have nothing against Herbert, but I guess there's something about Lynch's work that speaks to me, even a movie like Dune that he himself hated.

I am Herbert "fan". I think Lynch captured better the religious part, the mysticism of Dune. Without this, Dune is just another first person shooter.

I love Lynch and Dune, but his Dune was a cult film but not a good adaption. I mean the cat milking scene is absolutely a wtf.

Villeneuve version is the superior adaptation.

I really like the original Dune. While uncommon I think that hearing what people thought worked well. I also like the visuals, like the guild navigator or the disgusting baron.

That said I appreciate the new films too, in different ways. It looked amazing watching it in the IMAX theater, and I liked how the visions were presented. Not perfect films though, especially I think casting fewer big stars could have helped. I almost got distracted by the familiar faces.

Ouch.. I'm sad to just see this here for the first time. He's for sure, 100% had an impact on how my mind had grown as a child. It's sending shivers down my back to think of the people I was with when we touched the edge of the reality through 1 person.

I'm happy I never met him, not in the sense of meeting your heros, but in the sense of, 'some things are better left unsaid'. I took that with me after blue velvet, I didn't get that movie when i first saw it, I didn't pretend to, but I took that experience with me..

I argue sometimes how some topics are unrelated to Tech (hn) that get a good ratio, but this one really is one that makes me appreciate the method of madness.

Rest in peace big man. I'm who I am thanks to your work.

Edit with appreciation " (I still don't 'get' his movies) They impact my thinking.

I think this is one of those moments where the phrase "don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened" feels appropriate given his rich body of work.

I was young when dune was released and a big fan of herbert books. there was also star wars that ive seen at the same time. Dune is still today to me one of the great SF movies and I count a very few I really love (cloud atlas is another more recent one, speed racer too).

All his weirder movies were great experiences but my favorite ever Lynch movie is the Straight Story. such a perfect beautiful movie. I loved badalamenti music as well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCzAetSFRC8&ab_channel=amast...

I always thought writing and directing a movie of pure kindness and making it interesting as a piece of great art was the real mark of genius.

This makes me sad the same way that the death of David Bowie did.

“You’ve been seen associating with chickens Jack!”

Without David Lynch the world is just a little bit duller today. :(

This is an odd coincidence only because I've been stuck on playing https://soundcloud.com/overwerk/beyond today, which culminates in a sample from a Twin Peaks episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dc_6kDHWsEM (it's the "I've been looking out beyond the edge of the board" scene)

David Lynch embodies the quote from Thelonious Monk: "The genius is the one most like himself."

No matter what he did, no matter what you think of his works, he never compromised on being himself.

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Lynch

Lots already said about his films here, I'll just add that I recently watched "Lynch/Oz" which is a documentary that explores Lynch's lifelong obsession with The Wizard of Oz and how he often worked the themes of Oz into his films: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15399286/

Looks cool, I'll check that out.

Time to rewatch most of his films this weekend, a true visionary that we lost today and his contributions will live on forever.

The third season of Twin Peaks is the best piece of television I ever watched. Rest in peace, you will be missed.

NYT Obit https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/16/movies/david-lynch-dead.h...

I'm surprised, sad. Maybe the last of the big directors, certainly my favorite.

Here's Lynch making quinoa https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSP-ewdJYJc&ab_channel=scayn...

Ha ha, first time I’ve seen another reference to this! Back in the day, I got such a kick out of his description that I began imitating it myself, calling it my “David Lynch Special” dish.

May he rest in peace. I started watching everything he filmed when I was around 14 and immediately fell in love with his artistry. I recommend watching The Art Life (2018), about him, or just about any video featuring him that you can find on the Internet. Great character, indeed.

This is incredibly sad news. I guess I'm rewatching "Mulholland Drive" tonight

I don't know if this is the thing to remember him for, but given that we're on a long running message board, Lynch actually also used to run one long after he was already famous, and it probably produced one of the most Lynchian videos on the internet, him trying to read out an unpronounceable forum members username with panties from another fan in his mouth.

https://x.com/JFrankensteiner/status/1480286294634909697

He wasn't just a great creator with all the stuff that made him famous but genuinely funny and creative as a person, sad day.

One of the few mainstream Directors capable of producing an "emotional experience" rather than a strict narrative. If you've found his movies baffling, or non-sensical try to approach them with this mindset.

In old enough I’ve seen many heros die. But this is the first time I’m honestly surprised.

I was holding out hope he was actually immortal.

I know that sounds really weird, but that’s the sort of thing he inspired.

If anybody was going to live for ever it would be him.

I found this video of his on his spiritual beliefs to be very insightful

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4mTxm9sQg0

RIP

i hadn't seen it before, its so in-depth and informative. May be he was getting all those crazy ideas from Transcendental Meditation :)

Very sad. I had the privilege of watching the late Roger Ebert deconstruct "Mulholland Drive" at the Conference on World Affairs at the University of Colorado during the daily Cinema Interruptus. Each day for a week, we spent an hour or two analyzing the film, with anyone in the audience able to shout "stop" to pause the screening and discuss any aspect of the movie with Ebert. His insights and thoughtful manner of speaking about film left a lasting impression on me. RIP.

In heaven everything is fine.

Thanks you David to have shared with us your art life.

David Lynch's final message to the world:

https://www.reddit.com/r/davidlynch/comments/1fg3npu/david_l...

_____

May everyone be happy. May everyone be free of disease. May auspiciousness be seen everywhere. May suffering belong to no-one. Peace. Jai guru dev __________

RIP David Lynch, 20 January 1946 - 16 January 2025

It's amazing how some of the smaller, passing shots from his films stick with you. I haven't seen Elephant Man for decades but the scene at the beginning when he's at a freak show and his handler is forcing him to turn around for the audience still haunts me. Same for many of the scenes in Wild At Heart.

I saw Dune in the theater when I 9, I had no concept of who DL was at the time. But by the time I was in my teens ad saw Eraserhead and Twin Peaks it all gelled into the kind of creative breadth that one person could accomplish.

The world is so much better for having been visited by DL.

His bit with the Cow on median in Hollywood is hilarious.

I made a simple tribute site out of grief, just launched it. https://lynchforever.vercel.app ... Would love for you to leave a message, or feedback on how we can improve it (it was made in a couple of hours)

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/jan/16/david-lynch-twi...

Sad to hear. Personally I think I've only seen Mulholland Drive before, but long time ago. I enjoy surreal movies in general, so kind of weird I haven't seen more of Lynch's work. What personal favorites do other HNers have, of what he'd done?

Twin Peaks is the best TV show ever made

The first season is a masterpiece. Second season goes off the rails and loses direction fairly early on

But it's very much redeemed by the third season, which is every bit as good as the first season, albeit rather different in tone.

Part 8 of season 3 left a deep impression on me. I still think about it regularly.

"This is the water and this is the well. Drink full and descend. The horse is the white of the eyes and dark within."

(I had to check if that was part 8 - but of course it is.)

Last few episodes are great again, and then we got Fire Walk With Me which is awesome. Also check out the feature-length The Missing Pieces composed of scenes cut from Fire Walk, if you haven't.

Frankly I find even the "bad" stretch of S2 better than more than half of allegedly-good TV, anyway.

I agree, although on rewatches I have fast-forwarded through a lot of the James scenes in S2.

James-hate is common even among the more devoted fans of the show, I think.

https://www.tinymixtapes.com/features/why-we-hate-james-hurl...

I think about the "Watching Twin Peaks" comic around 2/3 down that page pretty much every time he's on screen. "Ugh yes please go," indeed.

Oddly, I liked him in The Return.

I really only dislike his scenes with Evelyn to be honest, it's one of the few subplots that just bores the hell out of me.

Blue Velvet and Wild At Heart are my two personal favorites. And as stated before, Twin Peaks is one of the greatest shows ever made.

If you enjoy surreal movies then definitely Blue Velvet and Wild at Heart. Just don't watch them with your kids. (Or parents...)

They are not 'normal', which is something I always admired about David Lynch. He had a very personal style and vision, and stuck with it.

Random anecdote along those lines: I got along great with my manager at my first full-time job, but was surprised when he mentioned one day that he wasn't interested in independent film at all. As an indie film lover myself, I asked him why.

He grew up in a very straight-laced conservative community, and he said that he and his friends tried to watch an independent film once, but they all found the film was far too disturbing. So after that he never tried again.

I asked what film they watched, and he answered Blue Velvet, and suddenly his perspective made a lot more sense to me!

My best Mullholland Drive experience: A couple of years ago a local arthouse cinema showed the movie again. It was brilliant, just like I remembered it.

After the showing, the projectionist came into the room and apologized for the confusing movie: "I must have mixed up the reels..."

She didn't.

What Did Jack Do? (netflix)

His PS2 commercial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Laf9vpJMDjA

Rabbits: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drjQfQtv2BQ

Aside from his films, I'd also suggest his still art (here's a video of him walking through an exhibition of his work at his alma mater: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmkJ3ff22gI). He's also got his music (I should note, the video was not directed by Lynch): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IugOfDBWcGc

I love Lost Highway. But, you have to watch the whole thing confused. Then have someone explain what's happening in the last scene. Then watch the whole thing again amazed. Also, the soundtrack was one of the first produced by Trent Reznor --long before he made a hobby of collecting Oscars.

And, I grew up watching Lynch's Dune over and over until it made sense :P

The soundtrack to Lost Highway is one of my top albums, all categories. Equally as fascinating, weird, violent and beautiful as the film itself. The tracks are masterfully sequenced, often blend into each other and form a complete work in itself.

It has long been my testbed for gapless playback on various hardware and software, often to my disappointment. (I'm not sure the experience is even available on streaming platforms, where things are normally playlists of disparate blobs of data, where perhaps "this track is not available in your region".)

As well as soundtracks, Lynch is a huge figure in sound design generally. He is a pioneer and master of several techniques that have entered the standard repertoire now, like foreshadowing, looming, use of rhythmic leitmotifs. A very creative pioneer. Will be missed. RIP.

To me that was his movie that made most sense. It seems a perfect allegorical depiction of what it means to have bad conscience.

Inland Empire is my favorite film of his, followed by the Twin Peaks movie, but I'm not sure the movie stands on its own without the TV show.

The Straight Story is not at all surreal, but rather simple and heart-warming, and somehow still somewhat weird.

Straight Story is such a pleasure to watch

I recommend starting at the beginning with Eraserhead. He hasn't made anything I would classify as less than brilliant.

https://archive.today/ySju3

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000186/

Awww We knew the day would come. What a legend of a man and artist. A recent living Dali, but far more underappreciated (even by those who loved him and didn't quite understand what his art was saying). I only hope to see more like him.

Loved the Twin Peaks tv series. Also the eighties Dune movie is a gold mine for awesome clips. RIP.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4NWOyPp1yg

I actually cried when I heard the news, not because he was one of my favorite directors exactly, but because you could feel a sense that an archetype for the arts of a generation left the earth. A seismic passing.

Wow -- I am shocked to read this news.

I don't consider too many people to be personal heroes but I did think of David Lynch in this way.

Rest in peace. Thank you for your creative output and your mad-passion for film and meditation.

Family announced on Facebook? Ironic, since David had said he was not on Facebook.

God speed you shinny diamond.

At 1:26 https://youtu.be/UwPprWxt9oo

He made DUNE. Few could at that time.

His thoughts on it: https://youtu.be/fG18Na5PDTg?si=eC-DtnuEWwouhr07

"Don't you think when people tell you you're allowed to do whatever you want as long as it's not sexually X-rated that they should stand behind their word and show your cow?"

- David Lynch

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqZpi8zAqe0

This little video is such a great tribute to him. RIP David.

David Foster Wallace on David Lynch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0Cvtu2FfGw

Sad day for film fans and a sad day for Phillip Morris stockholders.

Do you think the LA wildfires and poor air quality accelerated his death? He had emfysemia

Probably didn't help, but the man had been smoking since he was 8 years old and was at the point where he needed supplemental oxygen just to walk.

I would guess it probably triggered a crisis. He did an interview last year? where he talked about how bad his health was and his smoking. I read he had to be evacuated but I'm not certain it's true. That would have been a major stressor on him.

Haven't seen a director before or since with such a grasp of mystery and command of dreamlike sequences. The world lost one of the great directors of our time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTrTtzTQrv0

I find most fiction to be a weak substitute for life, but I found the ending of Twin Peaks (when Agent Cooper is turned by The Lodge) profound

I can't think of a director in the new generation of movie directors who are as original as most of the pieces made by DL. RIP, maestro!

Oh that’s really sad. A favourite director of mine.

His secret to his creativity and life:

https://youtu.be/BH4qD5Fzyjk

David Lynch's final message to the world, a video he sent to a fundraiser for his foundation last year:

https://www.reddit.com/r/davidlynch/comments/1fg3npu/david_l...

___________

May everyone be happy. May everyone be free of disease. May auspiciousness be seen everywhere. May suffering belong to no-one. Peace. Jai guru dev

_______

RIP David Lynch, 20 January 1946 - 16 January 2025

Farewell eagle scout from Missoula, Montana.

skimmed through comments, and it seems like no one mentioned his music

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbtUAlFN8po

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QJpY2VNP0E

rip

I was thinking of him last night after watching an old David Foster Wallace interview. Lynch was one of a kind.

rip to a legend

RIP, master. You'll be missed. ;~;7

What a guy, managed to meet him once! Sad all those American Spirits probably caused his untimely death.

In his own views: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2024/nov/15/david-lynch-emp...

RIP to one of my favorite filmmakers.

Terribly sad. His movies were a significant discovery for me and are now forever in my heart.

Blue Velvet. Twin Peaks. Lost Highway..

No words, just a feeling somewhere between waking and dreaming.

So sad

Among everything else, he made me discover one of my favourite bands, Au Revoir Simone

Thanks for sharing. TIL that there's a band named after a quote in "Pee-Wee's Big Adventure".

This morning I got up and poured myself a damned fine cup of coffee. RIP.

I loved his sense of humor.

If you haven't watched Mulholland Drive, just go watch it.

He was the reason for half my username, so long maestro.

“Beautiful blue skies and golden sunshine all along the way…”

I will eat quinoa for dinner tonight in his honor.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSP-ewdJYJc

Today no cinema.

No hay banda!

For David Lynch, his work with his foundation was the most important thing he did.

* [Here's the CEO of the David Lynch Foundation receiving the thanks of the Herndon, Virginia police department for teaching them TM for free:](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikMi0xqS8fU)

* Here's David Lynch chatting with President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, about teaching Ukrainian 100,000 veterans TM to help them with their PTSD.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xf7-mErKWlc)

* [Here's David Lynch meditating with 5,000 kids that his Foundation taught TM for free to in Brazil.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJD-M2FpKNU)

* [Here's Smithsonian Magazine's take on the David LynchFoundation (they gave him an award as Innovator of the Year for the work of his Foundation)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0iBaJ2K7JOo)

* [David Lynch discussing the work of his Foundation.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dxhkd_fZUTE)

* [Excerpts from the first David Lynch Foundation benefit concert (billed as "the Beatles Reunion concert by the press as it was headlined by Sir Paul and Sir Ringo)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJg5mKuCh7A)

* [Saving the disposable ones](https://www.cultureunplugged.com/documentary/watch-online/pl...) — a David Lynch Foundation. documentary about the work of Father Gabriel Mejia, a Roman Catholic priest whose Foundation has rescued 40,000 child prostitutes over the past 2 decades and taught them TM as therapy for PTSD.

* [Impacting Children’s Health Through Meditation Globally](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVCQJl1XVmg&t=230s) - the David Lynch Foundation's invited presentation at the Vatican about their work.

For more info, see: [The David Lynch Foundation](http://www.davidlynchfoundation.org) and [Fundación David Lynch de América Latina](https://fundaciondavidlynch.org)

"You know about death...that it's just a change, not an end." – The Log Lady

“The time has come for you to seek the Path. Your soul has set you face to face before the clear light ... and now you are about to experience it in its Reality, wherein all things are like the void and cloudless sky, and the naked, spotless intellect is like a transparent vacuum, without circumference or center... At this moment, know yourself and abide in that state.”

A Facebook post? Gross

Today, no movies…

One of the greats

Roman polanski defender. He signed the letter. Never forget

Shit. I wasn't expecting him to die anytime soon, so this came as a surprise.

RIP

He had to retire due to emphysema.

The work of his Foundation continues (as though anyone here takes it seriously).

I wasn't keeping up with his personal life, so it makes more sense now considering his illness. I still find it crazy how he remained a smoker for basically all his life even after it was proven to be awful for your health.

Heineken? Fuck that shit! Pabst Blue Ribbon!

Never tripped out harder than watching Blue Velvet one lonely night.

Also Twin Peaks, so trippy.

A true legend RIP

"Today, no music"

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