David Lynch, Take 2

Awards committees may ignore him, but since many of us think there's no such thing as too much David Lynch — and this is a prerequisite for viewing his latest three-hour mind bender, "Inland Empire," by the way — I thought I'd post a few outtakes from my recent interview with the filmmaker.

Q: How are you able to do what you do — establish a kind of surrealistic logic that breaks all the rules of narrative — and yet make viewers accept that the final product is actually artful and at least somewhat intentional even if it appears…?
A: "I understand exactly what you're saying. Because it’s the power of cinema, I think."

Q: But it seems more unique than that. Like in jazz, anyone can string notes together, but only certain level of artist can make it seem as though a bunch of abstract components actually belong together and lead to something truly inspired and transcendent.
A: "For sure. And that’s really good, what you’re saying. I would say that those are the ideas talking. I would be lost without ideas. And when you have one idea, even if it’s just a fragment, it starts becoming the bait to draw other ideas. … It’s almost like you get a piece of the puzzle at a time and it all exists somewhere, you’re just getting it by fragment. There is a whole somewhere, and your job is to translate these ideas to this medium and stay true to the idea. If you stay true to it, hopefully the whole thing will come and hold together. You just don’t walk away until it feels correct based on the original idea."

Q: Do you step back, the way you would with one of your paintings?
A: "Yes, you have to step back. And a lot of times you’re in it so deep you lose objectivity. And when you see the whole, what you think is the finished film, many times, especially with other people, you get a shock. And you say no, that isn’t correct, and you go back to work to make it feel correct."

Q: “Inland Empire” never had a script, right?
A: "It has a final script now, but it didn’t in the beginning. … It came together in pieces, but each beginning piece was shot. But shot not to make a feature film; shot not knowing."

Q: Does it seem odd to you that we have all kinds of blockbusters that show people being exploited and brutalized by the hundreds, yet your films are the ones characterized as weird and demented and dark?
A: "There are many absurdities to life."