Empire building

i suspect that rather than narrative, we are confronted with fragile raw material for a disembodied subconscious, of the sort for which, ostensibly, a way might be found to put the pieces together into something resembling things like 'character', or 'personality'. philosophers like Campbell might have you believing they are the same thing, that narrative is the summation of subconscious. David Lynch seems to argue otherwise. instead one realizes that 'narrative' is as artificial a construct for the subconscious as 'plot' is for real life.

the narrative exists, but rather than being the framework upon which 'events' are hung like adornments, the narrative hangs delicately from the events, or visions: typically, for Lynch, a framework that consists of a mishmash of hallucinations, memories and nightmares/dreams. (remember: the mind makes no distinction between any of them; it is mere consciousness that imposes such definitions, and disallows substitution and transitivity.) also, the framework, the skeleton, is the meat.

in the end, however, in spite of or perhaps because of all that, Inland Empire manages to be the most surprisingly uplifting of Lynch's films. when what might possibly be reality--and we are never told that it is: Lynch presents, instead, a naked id we must clothe with our own egos to come up with anything approaching 'sense'--when what i think might be reality finally breaks through all the hooplah, we are given, thankfully, some relief from the grotesquerie, the guignol, and, more than that, we are offered that startling gem that is so valuable when it is found in arthouse cinema: a happy ending; and a surprisingly sympathetic, 'meaningful' one, at that. Lynch's work has always been informed with a core of humanity, no matter how obscure or deeply buried, but Empire seems more so than the rest, and we eventually come to realize that it is a film that, again more than any other in the Lynch catalogue, wears its heart on its sleeve. but is it really 'good cinema'? i suspect not. in fact, in many ways, it is a horrible piece of 'cinema', perhaps even the worst. but i suppose it wouldn't hurt if we were to call it 'art', if only in the Lanarkian sense of the term.

and damned if i don't love every crudely pretentious, obscurist minute of it.

and yes, while i see no real point in saying it since most reviews seem to gravitate to the fact eventually, and it seems the one point of agreement between most (all?) critics of the film, i say it here because, dammit, it is deserved: Laura Dern is amazing.

right. been reeling from all that balderdash since last night. glad to finally get it all out.

more pretentiousness on Inland Empire here:

http://messageboard.inlandempirecinema.com/forum/index.php

on the spinner: Challengers, The New Pornographers, and Voodoo, Terez Montcalm.

currently reading: The Wave Theory of Angels, Alison MacLeod and 334, Thomas Disch