Pondering Lynch's Digital Empire

For better or for worse, David Lynch has turned his back on film. After experiencing the creative freedom that only digital filmmaking can allow while making his three-hour, self-distributed behemoth Inland Empire, Lynch vowed never to touch film again. And there’s nothing that you, or anybody else, can do to convince him otherwise.

As a result, the new Lynch aesthetic captures a freewheeling, no-holds-barred style emblematic of the filmmaking process itself. Inland Empire is a 179-minute epic with a collection of interwoven, seemingly unrelated images and ideas strung together by the “story” of Hollywood actress Nikki Grace (Laura Dern). Grace attempts to act in a film, which her personal life eventually starts to resemble and even overlaps, and Inland Empire then develops into a surreal, uniquely Lynchian journey that cannot be accurately described in any short form.

Whether you like it or not, Inland Empire is truly an experience like no other.

While my description may bring to mind similar films from Lynch’s canon, especially the Hollywood-set Mulholland Drive, Inland Empire’s structure moves with such an unlimited freedom that it’s almost as if Lynch’s previous films were censored from his true intention by analog film. With Inland Empire, and Lynch’s newfound style, we have a Lynch totally without restraint or apology. Except it never seemed like he was restrained in the first place.

David Lynch is not for the casual observer. He is an acquired taste whose confounding, often inaccessible films force active participation on behalf of the viewer. The consumer of Lynch’s work is often forced to derive his or her own meaning from the material. And Lynch himself is no help: he always refuses to speak about any details of his films or record any commentaries on his DVDs, as he openly prefers—even challenges—the viewer to derive their own personal meaning from the film. I attended a Q&A at my university in which Lynch promoted his form of transcendental meditation. When an audience member asked him if he would describe what Mulholland Drive is “about,” Lynch directly responded, “No.” When another audience member asked if the “house in Lost Highway was inside or outside reality,” Lynch dryly stated, “Sort of,” and said nothing more.

He’s a curious character, but you have to admire his determination to let his films truly belong to the audience, and not succumb to the popular temptation of telling the inherent meaning behind every decision he made behind the camera on DVD commentaries.

But what makes Lynch’s analog films so great is that beyond the confounding structure and imagery, there seems to be a delicate and carefully chosen meaning behind everything we see and hear. While I may adopt my own personal interpretations to some of his films, I take comfort in knowing that Lynch himself makes careful decisions while filming and has a specific idea of what his films mean, even though he chooses not to disclose this. As a result, Eraserhead, Blue Velvet and Mulholland Drive are works of art whose interpretations are vast and infinitely debatable.

Lynch openly states that when he first started making what would become Inland Empire, he didn’t think that it would be a feature-length film, as he was only experimenting with digital technology and later found associations between several of his projects that he would later combine into a feature. With a process like this, it’s easy to see how quickly this can make a very long movie—especially in Lynch’s style, independent of any typical narrative cohesion. Lynch even incorporates one of his previous filmic shorts, Rabbits, into Inland Empire.

This free-association filmmaking style feels drastically different from Lynch’s previous films. The problem is, if Lynch had no set goal for Inland Empire as a cohesive feature, then he probably has no specific personal idea of what the film means. What type of meaning are we supposed to derive from a project that is basically a montage of several of Lynch’s unrelated works? If the film has no inherent meaning in the mind of the filmmaker, it can’t be experienced like the seemingly deliberate Mulholland Drive or Eraserhead. Even the cast has openly stated that they don’t understand the film. Watching Inland Empire feels like the experience of making it: trying to find a film from segments of totally separate projects (ie. Rabbits).

Analog film forces the filmmaker to make better-prepared decisions because of the complexity of the medium, and the “creative freedom” digital video allows keeps Lynch from making the deliberate, informed and inspired decisions that he probably made with his masterpieces created from traditional film.

What we have now is an experimental Lynch who makes decisions on instinct instead of deliberation.

Lynch is still in an excited stage where he’s toying with the medium, and has yet to find his true voice within it. Lynch has to grasp and learn this medium until it molds itself in a way that suits his filmmaking style, and then he can make films with a new, forward-moving aesthetic that also complements his previous work. DV is a totally different aesthetic than film, like switching from oil to acrylic paint, and it must be treated in such a way that acknowledges its own opportunities and weaknesses. Lynch is elated with the freedom digital filmmaking allows, but doesn’t quite have a grasp on its unique possibilities in the way that other filmmakers who truly crafted the technology have (I’ll avoid naming any examples, because it feels ridiculous to compare Lynch to any other specific filmmaker). All great art involves restraint of some sort, even if the medium used provides little option for it.

But on the other hand, filmmaking today is treated in a way that pretends every decision made on set was immaculate and completely intentional. Behind the scenes documentaries and commentaries go on and on praising every major member of the cast and crew, and explain to a sickening degree the intentionality of every minor detail seen on screen. But anybody who has ever been on a film set is aware of the circumstance, collaboration and even accidental nature that leads to a film’s final product (whether made on DV or film). Some of the most inspired parts of a final product can be purely unintentional or serendipitous. Nobody can predict the weather, behavior of the cast and crew, or last minute decisions that affect filmmaking. Just like in writing (or any other art form, rather), there is a plethora of possibilities that affects how you intend something to turn out in your head, and how it actually turns out. There is always some distance between the pen and the brain.

We need more artists like Lynch, those who realize that “inherent meaning” in any art form only extends so far, that art is truly in the eye of the beholder, and that all art is only as good as the interpretation of the person who receives it. Perhaps with Inland Empire, we are even free from the notion that the intent of the artist needs to exist at all, as Lynch allows the art form to take on a life all its own, taking place of the artist in determining the final product. This is truly a democratic way of experiencing film, just as digital technology is a democratic way of making it.

I’m just not sure if I’ve warmed up to it quite yet.

Today's Celebrity: Living La Dolce Vita

Lindsay Lohan dominated the headlines last week when she was arrested for cocaine possession and driving under the influence after chasing her former personal assistant’s mother around Santa Monica. This happened less than a month after Lohan, barely twenty-one, was released from rehab.

This is certainly not the first of erratic displays from Lohan. Last year, while filming Georgia Rule, producer James G. Robinson threatened to sue her for constantly showing up over an hour late to set, often hung over. Robinson wrote to Lohan:

"You and your representatives have told us that your various late arrivals and absences from the set have been the result of illness; today we were told it was 'heat exhaustion'. We are well aware that your ongoing all night heavy partying is the real reason for your so-called 'exhaustion'."

Also dominating the “news” this week was Britney Spears’ crazed, belligerent behavior at a photo shoot for OK! Magazine that was supposed go with an article declaring her comeback after years of similar (and highly publicized) behavior since her marriage, divorce and pregnancies.

In other news, Nicole Richie was sentenced to four days in jail for driving under the influence after taking her “Mercedez Benz the wrong way down California State Route 134 highway in Burbank. After failing an on-field sobriety test, Richie admitted to having smoked marijuana and taking a vicodin painkiller. (imdb)”. Richie is rumored to currently be pregnant with the child of Good Charlotte’s lead singer, Joel Madden.

All this happened mere weeks after Paris Hilton was released from jail.

And this stuff gets more media attention than the Iraq war.

For years, young girls have admired this quartet of young women who have really done nothing with their clout and fortune but be famous and act famous. Spears hasn’t released any new music since 2005. Lohan hasn’t been in a successful film since Mean Girls in 2004, which wasn’t even that enormous of a hit in terms of box office gross. Hilton and Richie don’t really have jobs—they aren’t singers or actresses, though they’ve tried and failed; they only exist to give OK! Magazine and the like something to write about. (And no, being on a reality TV show doesn’t count as a “job”.) Lohan and Spears are no better. They aren’t artists, they don’t have any work ethic (ie. you’re not an actress if you show up an hour late on set), and they don’t make any real contribution to society.

These four overwhelming media figures play without work. They live a life of privilege without justification. They have no gifts, talents or words to share with the rest of us, no practical purpose in the natural order of the world. They are, quite literally, useless human beings. And yet we lavish them with attention.

If I had a daughter who admired somebody like Paris Hilton, I would shield her from every media outlet I possibly could. That America’s young have come to admire people who are famous for neglecting work, family or any moral responsibility whatsoever in favor of endless nights of partying is frightening. That girls barely in their double digits actually consider a hotel heiress to be a role model—one who is arguably most famous because of her sex video—should be enough to give alarm to us all. Or, at least, one would hope.

With this quartet’s recent string of stints with the law, drugs and outright insanity, I hope, I hope, I hope this is the beginning of the end of this type of media infatuation. I hope Americans who once admired these figures will see how these celebrities' lifestyles have caught up with them, that a life free of responsibility certainly has its consequences.

Then the paparazzo can turn their cameras where they rightfully belong: Brangelina and Tom Cruise.

I saw La Dolce Vita (1960) last week for the first time in years. The film admires a movie star life without consequence or commitment, but then slowly reveals how this lifestyle makes it impossible to make any real connection with a human being. Fellini allows us to admire the beauty of "la dolce vita", but at the same time realize its hollowness. The infamous scene at the Trevi fountain is perfectly indicative of this. Celebrity journalist Marcello (Marcello Mastroianni) admires voluptuous movie star Sylvia (Anita Ekberg) as she gracefully meanders in the fountain. But, as soon as Marcello joins her and tries to kiss her, the entire moment sobers: the fountain stops running, the sun comes out, and no connection has been made.

La Dolce Vita is credited for giving the English language the word “paparazzi,” as the journalists who stalk celebrities in the film are referred to as “paparazzo (little birds)”. Fellini makes the audience experience the characters of La Dolce Vita as if we too were paparazzi. We have little knowledge of the aspirations, wants, or needs of these characters. There is no psychological element here, no third dimension. We are simply intrusive observers of the lives of the rich and famous.


It is unclear, for the most part, what types of films the actress Sylvia makes, or why a figure like Maddalena (Anouk Aimee) gets so much media attention. It doesn’t matter what these people are famous for, it only matters that they are celebrities. Their fame is their career.

Such is the status of today’s dominant media figures. It doesn’t matter what Lohan, Spears, Hilton and Richie have done to become famous, for they have ingrained themselves in our national consciousness and vocabulary to such a degree that they don’t need to make films, release albums or appear on television to continue to be famous. Their fame is literally their career.

(There’s one scene where Marcello and Maddalena drive a prostitute around town and, when she enters the car with these two, it becomes evident that even women of the night have a better work ethic than privileged celebrities...)


Fellini predicted how a then-recent cultural phenomenon would grow exponentially. Some saw Fellini’s film as satirizing the celebrity/media relationship when it first became an international sensation almost fifty years ago, but today’s cult(ure) of fame has reached such ridiculous degree that it’s beyond satire. Back in the day, an actor or musician would have had to continue releasing work to continue being in the media spotlight—not today. Our society not only worships mediocre music (Spears) or unprofessional acting (Lohan), but they worship singers that don’t sing and actors that don’t act. When Paris Hilton announced her “retirement” last year, the big question on everyone’s mind was, “retirement from WHAT?”

Princess Diana was killed almost exactly ten years ago. Di was a celebrity beyond celebrity, a figure that actually exceeded the media attention Americans bestow on their celebrities. But unlike today’s headliners, Di—a kindergarten teacher-turned-princess with a humanitarian heart—actually made an effort to do some good in the world. Her unfortunate death is the only celebrity death that immediately comes to mind that was actually caused by paparazzi.

Paparazzi have a frighteningly influential role in our culture. As evidenced by the case of Princess Diana, they aren’t just intrusive observers, but have direct consequence on their subjects. The endless attention they have given to Lohan, Spears, Hilton and Richie only encourages the quartet's irresponsible behavior. Not that these 21-26-year olds aren’t accountable for themselves, of course. Their own accountability is the one thing they’ve all failed to fully realize.

I just really, really want it all to stop.