By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 4.75 cats
Director: David Lynch
Starring: Grace Zabriskie | Harry Dean Stanton | Jeremy Irons | Justin Theroux | Laura Dern | Peter J. Lucas
Country: france, poland, united_states
Year: 2006
Running time: 172
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0460829/
Chris says: “Instead of a filming a completed screenplay, David Lynch took a piecemeal approach to making INLAND EMPIRE: encouraged by the physical freedom a toy-sized digital video camera allows, he would think of an idea, write it down, and then immediately film it, letting the story develop with each individual fragment or improvisation. It’s essential to consider and understand this means of composition when approaching the finished work, and irrelevant to dismiss it for not making sense. This is an avant-garde film that favors texture and feeling over logic or linearity. The director’s most experimental effort since ERASERHEAD, it’s a challenging ride, but one worth taking.
“Most of it centers on Nikki (Laura Dern), a Hollywood actress starring in a remake of a film whose original version was never completed because the leads died of mysterious circumstances while filming. Many early scenes revolve around Nikki, her co-star Devon (Justin Theroux) and their director Kingsley (Jeremy Irons) as the shoot begins. However, it’s not long before Nikki becomes unable to differentiate between herself and her character. From there, it’s a slow glide through Lynch’s rabbit hole: we see Dern as Nikki but also as a housewife in a mid-20th century tract home and an Aileen Wuornos-like figure in a dingy interrogation chamber where she confesses lurid incidents to a silent bespectacled man. We also see strange, enigmatic sequences shot in the snowy, industrial Polish city of Lodz, snatches of an eerie nuclear family sitcom (complete with laugh track) populated by a cast wearing, well, rabbit suits, plus dancing whores and Laura Palmer’s mother, too!
“As a long-awaited follow-up to the monumental MULHOLLAND DR., this is not exactly a retread, although it’s hard to imagine it existing without its predecessor. Those infuriated by MULHOLLAND’S fascinating final third will probably be annoyed that this one plays like a three-hour extension of its dream logic and shifting personalities. But where that film focused on a dreamer slowly awakening into consciousness before succumbing to encroaching insanity, this one explores more in-depth how a persona gradually shatters and dissolves, its world becoming ever more abstract, with layers of recurring motifs piling up until they resemble something close to madness.
“Although this film lacks some of its predecessor’s tenderness, it retains its adventurous, twisted spirit. Few directors can still match Lynch in terms of gorgeously sinister imagery, elaborate sound design, and utter originality (and creepiness). An actress I’ve always admired, Dern is just phenomenal here; she’s bravely willing to reach out to the furthest possible limb to display a complexity of emotions, from amiable and heroine-like to frightening and downright ugly. Towards the film’s ethereal, almost rapturous conclusion, Lynch temporarily pulls the rug out from under us, offering a fleeting explanation for what we’ve seen, only to pull back again and offer more reasons to doubt that one exists. INLAND EMPIRE can be frustrating for sure, but Lynch’s openness and seemingly endless creativity makes for one compelling experiment and experience. 4 1/2 cats.”
Michael says: “As others have said, how do you review the latest David Lynch film, INLAND EMPIRE, when there is nothing by way of a plot to really talk about, and the imagery is so wide open to interpretation that structuring a review is nearly impossible? I guess you just talk about impressions and your own thoughts. That’s what I will attempt to do here.
“I will start off by saying that I really enjoyed INLAND EMPIRE. It was truly an experience that took me to another world, so completely, that upon leaving the cinema I felt like I really had been someplace else, and I was really glad to be back. The film belongs almost completely to Lynch, and his nightmarish, perplexing vision, but if anyone else gets to share some of the credit, it’s certainly Laura Dern who plays a handful of characters (it’s unsure just how many) and travels with Lynch on this labyrinthine journey through the unsettling hallways of his mind. Superficially, Dern plays Nikki Grace, no, not a porn star, despite the name, but a legitimate actress, who wins a coveted part that will hopefully see a return to her glory days. Jeremy Irons plays Kingsley Stewart, the director of the film, and Justin Theroux, butched up (if I may borrow an apt phrase I enjoyed from a review I read) to play the leading man, Devon Berk. The film, indecipherably titled ‘On High in Blue Tomorrows’ turns out to have a past. Despite what the two leads have been told, it is a remake of a film that was never finished due to a ‘curse.’ It seems the leads in the original film were murdered before the film was finished.
“After an hour or so of scenes revolving around Nikki and Devon shooting the film and growing closer, despite dire warnings of the jealousy and potential danger of Nikki’s husband, any semblance of plot is chucked out the window as Dern begins morphing into a variety of characters, each in her own mini-story or situation. There is the blue-collar wife, the tough woman being pursued by Doris Side, a character from ‘Blue Tomorrows’ who claims to have been hypnotized into killing Dern’s character with a screwdriver, and one of a posse of prostitutes who dole out advice, then indulge in some synchronized dancing to ‘The Locomotion.’
“It sounds crazy, doesn’t it? Well it is, and it’s probably not a good idea to try to figure it out or make it add up to anything… at least while you’re watching the film. Better to just sit back and enjoy the ever-increasing roller-coaster ride. Along the way, you can marvel at Dern’s spellbinding performance. You can alternatively laugh and cringe at the creepy and hysterical supporting bit by Lynch regular, Grace Zabriske, as Nikki’s prophetic neighbor (that scene is probably the high point for me). You can flinch at the ghastly image Lynch throws at you in the form of strangely distorted faces looming into the camera. You can scratch your head at the perplexing scenes set in Poland, where prostitutes and Polish heavies wander snow-strewn streets. You can sit dumbfounded as a canned laugh track plays over scenes of human-sized bunnies conversing in banal non-sequitors. You can even feel moved at the tragic death scene of one of Dern’s characters that may or may not really be happening.
“In the end, the thread that links all these random moments together is film. I think Lynch has strung together some of his inner mewsings on the film world, and even more, the independent film world. The setting of this film is firmly placed in Hollywood, perhaps the same, dark, dangerous Hollywood that was the setting of his last, relatively straight-forward film, MULHOLLAND DR. It seems that right under Hollywood’s nose, there are countless films being made, or yet to be made by independent visionaries outside of the system.
“Another fascinating interpretation revolves around Laura Dern. Lynch has said INLAND EMPIRE is about a woman in trouble. It has been said fairly often, that women in the movies, or more specifically, in Hollywood movies, are women in trouble. After actress’ reach a certain age, the parts begin to dry up. Dern, and her character, Nikki Grace, are both entering this phase of an actress’ career. Then along comes Lynch who generously gives Dern not one, but a handful of perplexing, complicated parts to play… in this case, all in one film. In some ways, this film is a gift to Dern, one that she accepts fearlessly and with relish. In the end, we must thank both Lynch and Dern for realizing this mind-blowing journey for the big screen and letting us share in what is most certainly a singular and personal vision. If, at three-hours, it feels a little self-indulgent, at least it never leaves you bored. 5 cats.”
Kate says: “I never write reviews, and I’m not sure that this really qualifies as a review, either. Jeff and I caught the 1pm showing at the Brattle today. I went into this film with no idea what to expect, I hadn’t read anything about it, and had no idea what I was in for – other than ‘directed by David Lynch.’ He just gets Lynchier and Lynchier…
“While I struggled with the ‘meaning’ of this film (because, let’s face it, there is no ‘plot’ in the usual sense of the word), I think Lynch is commenting on the actor’s perception of time and reality as opposed to the real world in which they live. The story, such as it is, revolves around Nikki Grace (Laura Dern) and her new role in a film being directed by Kingsley Stewart (Jeremy Irons). She is told at a meeting with Kingsley and his personal assistant Freddie (Harry Dean Stanton) and her co-star Devon Berk (Justin Theroux) that Stewart’s film is a remake of a film that was never completed, because the principal actors died (were murdered?).
“There are many references to time, and being out-of-synch with time; I am probably mis-quoting: ‘It is after midnight. But it is really 9:45…’ said by Grace Zabruskie as the creepy uninvited visitor to Nikki’s mansion. Nikki says ‘I can’t tell if it’s yesterday or tomorrow and it’s a real mind f—‘ For me, it conjures the sense of deja vu that must be experienced by film actors who perform scenes, then watch the rushes after the fact – they are witnesses to their own recorded past and edited future, since the dailies will be processed and cut to look strikingly different. They may repeatedly perform the same scene, to have it sliced and diced on the screen for close-ups or long-shots. They film scenes out of sequence, they film night scenes during the day or vice versa, due to the magic of soundstages, and special effects can alter physical reality in order to make them appear to do something they never really did at all… it must indeed f— the mind as to what was truly experienced and when.
“The convolution of the stories, the sense of ‘history repeating itself,’ Nikki Grace seemingly channeling her deceased predecessor in the role, I think this is Lynch’s joke that nothing new gets made in Hollywood, everything we see is a remake of something else, or at least small pieces are stolen from a variety of sources. When Twin Peaks was being broadcast, I always laughed at the theme song by Angelo Badalmenti, because I thought it sounded like ‘Do the Locomotion,’ and hehehe, Lynch inserts ‘The Locomotion’ into this film. As well as several of his favorite actors from previous films. Everything old is new again?
“And then there are the giant rabbit people having a pointless conversation (if this doesn’t mean anything to you, look up ‘Rabbits’ on imdb.com).
“The camera is often claustrophobically close to the actors’ faces, almost fish-eyed in effect combined with a lack of crisp focus. Other than Laura Dern and Grace Zabruskie, I was not particularly impressed with any of the performances – most of the characters are flat and one-dimensional. Since the story is non-linear and fractured into dream-like fragments, there is little in the way of conventional character development. Dern portrays at least 4 different characters (I lost track), I can’t imagine how she kept it all straight, but she makes the film worth watching.”