Review of Eraserhead (1977) by The Phantom C — 04 Nov 2012

I pretty much hate movies like this. I don't watch movies to work at figuring something out if the process of watching it is painfully boring. Perhaps there's a group of people who can sit in rapt attention as this series of horrific, absurd, and just plain bizarre images washes over them and discern in it some meaning, or at least enjoy experiencing it; then perhaps there's another group, to which I belong, who find everything too random and obscure, the concrete too submerged to latch onto.

There's plenty to marvel at here; Lynch's preoccupations and sensibilities are clear enough already here. I prefer pretty much everything thing else he's done, especially Blue Velvet, which is plenty strange and unsettling and sublime, but more immediate.