David Lynch: An Appreciation

“Hero” is a word that rarely comes to mind.

In many ways I don’t even like it, the word, but when thinking about David Lynch on the day he died, it’s one of the words that first came to mind. Just kind of bubbled up.

“Savior” was next, which I know is dramatic but perhaps that’s the reason for its relevance. Like many kids, I wasn’t comfortable. Not comfortable in my own skin, in our home, in school. It felt like life was somewhere else but that somewhere was just a big blank hole filled with boredom, awkwardness, and anger.

A first early glimpse at something other was hearing Tom Waits’ Small Change in 1976 blasting from my friend’s brother’s car stereo on the way to a Rick Derringer/Foreigner double bill which was, as you might expect, a show I didn’t need to see. But Tom Waits was a revelation, a crack in hook-laden 70s rock (and Roll, Hoochie Koo!) that felt as tired and bored as me. I was ready for an earthquake.

Film, and my appreciation of it, didn’t fully ignite until college. In between the School of Visual Arts and Bennington I spent 1 day as a film major at NYU but that’s another story. Of greater importance was every Thursday night at Bennington a small group of film enthusiasts walked us through classics, foreign and domestic.

After college living in NYC I explored as much film as I could get my eyes on. My first apartment was a short walk to the Thalia on 95th St. where I sat through, among countless others, a full weekend of Fassbinder taking short naps without leaving late into the night when the cockroaches came out and marched over the arched tops of seat back rows like tiny soldiers expertly navigating foothills.

Blue Velvet came out in 1986, a year after Bennington, and I went to see it on the big screen. From the first flickering images I knew this was something else. The audience added to the delight—oohs, aahs, gasps, and plenty of laughter lifted the mood so high I felt weightless, tumbling through this strange seductive twisted up world.

And the hits just kept coming with Twin Peaks on TV sealing the deal—somewhere else was finally home.