No problem, Yambag. No more quoting, here.
I've read all your posts above.
You've made it clear why you dislike The Return which leads me to the expectation that there are other films/programs you prefer...So I'm eager to know if you have other films or programs you'd recommend? If I knew more about your tastes. maybe that would collapse some of the gulf between us re: different reactions to The Return , taste preferences, etc.
I understand what Yambag is saying. And I'm sorry that he isn't enjoying Twin Peaks Season 3 as much as others. That's art though right? 10 people can watch the same film/series/painting and have 10 different emotional responses to it. We're all different human beings, and one person's reaction and emotional responses to something should never validate/invalidate another person's reaction and emotional responses.
Yambag stated that he is "feeling boredom", "disappointment" and that he's not feeling any emotions evoked from it. That is a totally fair assessment, and a true one as he is stating his reaction to this season of Twin Peaks.
I have an opposite emotional response to it, I'm enthralled and 100 percent emotionally involved in the 13 hours I've seen already.
And I'm sure the millions of other viewers fall into a million different ranges.
I'm just happy that we are getting the opportunity to watch filmmaking/storytelling like this. I don't really care where the money comes from to make Twin Peaks, as long as the money givers aren't influencing artistic control/artistic content. And to me, that is what arthouse cinema is about.
Woody Allen, Quentin Tarantino, Jim Jarmsuch, E. Elias Merhige and David Lynch are 5 examples of writers/directors that are able to make their films with ZERO influence from the financers. It's pure art, no matter how big the studio or network that is funding them, and no matter how much money they get, and no matter how external marketing happens around the product. It's the final product itself that matters. If it's untouched and unmeddled with, and the artist has final control, then it's arthouse.
That's my definition of arthouse anyway. So the film Begotten and the film Amelie, two films that couldn't be any more different artistically, are both arthouse productions because despite their massive differences in budgets and distribution, they are both made from a singular artist. Pure art comes in many forms.
I will admit that while I've had some boredom and disappointment, I have been locked in to evey second of every episode. It's the one show i can't mess around on my phone on Facebook (or here lol) and focus, out of fear of missing Something.
I didnt expect s3 to start at the black lodge and be 100mph for 18 episodes. I think it'd insane to not know lynch would start slow. but I also didn't expect it to drag as much and as long as it has.
But episode 13 gave me hope. It was much better paced with less worthless (imo) scenes.
I hope the pacing of Episode 13 that you liked Yambag carries forward for the last 5 episodes. I think it's going to be a 100mph finish!
No problem, Yambag. No more quoting, here.
I've read all your posts above.
You've made it clear why you dislike The Return which leads me to the expectation that there are other films/programs you prefer...So I'm eager to know if you have other films or programs you'd recommend? If I knew more about your tastes. maybe that would collapse some of the gulf between us re: different reactions to The Return , taste preferences, etc.
Yambag: My reason for asking is that I suspect the beef that you and Kdawg have with me (and vice versa) has more to do with differences in taste and/or entirely understandable suspicions about art and ideology than it does to do with the various proxy arguments we've been having ('art vs. not-art,' 'arthouse vs. not-arthouse,' 'social justice warrior' vs. 'social justice').
I don't blame anybody for feeling weary or suspicious of the elitism that inheres in the notion of artistic autonomy... That said, I find American media corporations to be sort of like... garbage factories, generally? So I can't help but feel hopeful when, by dint of whatever accident of circumstance or savvy narrow-casting/portfolio diversifying on Showtime's part, a US media company bites on something like Twin Peaks ...
...because I believe the food analogy for media consumption-- one's 'media diet'-- is apt. The method in which some food production occurs carries more 'negative externalities,' so to speak, for a society than other methods... Generally, I think that "content" that makes people think is preferable to content that doesn't... and that "content" that doesn't can have unintended social effects...
But, of course, I would never wish to encroach upon the freedom of all consumers to view and eat whatever they desire, however they desire, whenever they desire. That would be unfair...
I hope the pacing of Episode 13 that you liked Yambag carries forward for the last 5 episodes. I think it's going to be a 100mph finish!
If that's the case, I will be happy with the overall product. I've said all season that while things have been slow, there was time to deliver. Hopefully the pace keeps kicking up.
No problem, Yambag. No more quoting, here.
I've read all your posts above.
You've made it clear why you dislike The Return which leads me to the expectation that there are other films/programs you prefer...So I'm eager to know if you have other films or programs you'd recommend? If I knew more about your tastes. maybe that would collapse some of the gulf between us re: different reactions to The Return , taste preferences, etc.
I don't dislike it.
It has been disappointing, but I still like it. That may sound contradictory, but it isnt.
My favourite shows ever are (in no particular order)
Twin peaks
Lost (yes I know the ending was flawed, still loved the series)
The shield
Sopranos
Breaking bad
I'm leaving out comedies and non dramas (cheers/the wonder years would be my picks here)
Thanks, Yambag. You're steeped in what I've elsewhere described as "prestige TV" and no doubt your expectations/preferences re: The Return are closer to those of the broadest audience than to the Lynch devotees , corroborating the distinction you pointed out to me some time back. (FWIW, I watched all the shows you mentioned save for The Shield and I enjoyed them all, so we're not so different after all! I just get something from The Return I have not yet been able to find anywhere else in the mass media environment... i.e., not the "art house")
to echo Jack again, I hope you find that it fulfills your expectations/desires by the end! In fact, it's only if we both enjoy that it will prove to worthy of the lofty neologisms (e.g., 'mass-mediated art'/'elevated entertainment'/'mainstream arthouse') it's been posited to be, in this thread and others (by yours truly, and others...)
We'll see! Either way, I look forward to more such discussions!
I don't think there are so many questions that need be answered in this season. It's really more a mood piece.
The number of questions is rather deceptive. We think there are more than there actually are. In truth, we're finding out more than the characters are collectively.
I don't think there are so many questions that need be answered in this season. It's really more a mood piece.
The number of questions is rather deceptive. We think there are more than there actually are. In truth, we're finding out more than the characters are collectively.
Fascinating point, Aaron. It occurred to me a while back that Lynch seems to be more actively voyeuristic in his view into some of the private/interior lives of Twin Peaks' new residents than others.... I now suspect that some of the characters mentioned but unseen and some of the characters we have seen but have not been explained (e.g., Renee, the fan of James Hurley who makes eyes at him in the premiere and cries during the performance of "Just You") will simply go unexplained...
Something new and interesting about the new series, in other words, is its "keyhole vignettes" that provide hints of context for the main plot arcs but may never be explained or explored.
Interestingly, if this hypothesis is correct, then it seems to me the net effect is to thematize the "wrong turns" the original series took (the affair between the wealthy heiress and James Hurley, "Little Nicky," etc.) to make such tangents an intrinsic part of the storytelling, albeit a beguiling one...
I don't think there are so many questions that need be answered in this season. It's really more a mood piece.
The number of questions is rather deceptive. We think there are more than there actually are. In truth, we're finding out more than the characters are collectively.
I'd need to see these questions to decide if there's more or less than I thought.
I couldn't disagree more that this is more of a mood piece that answerig questions. It's impossible imo to revisit a place/cast after 25 years and not have a mountain of questions.
"It takes guts -- and a little bit of the devil -- to do what he does"
It would take even more guts to really deviate from what people expect from him. Such as add intellectual depth to all that artistic style. Make something deeply earnest instead of ironic winking and nodding and satire. Make the picture so realistic that you feel like you're really there (Danish royal drama with Alicia Vikander a few years back). Top Sokurov and do an even longer take than the unbroken 90 min. in that tour of the Hermitage in 2002. Make something as bubbly and cutesy as Amelie.
The options for doing something new and not stereotypically Lynchian are limitless and he has the talent for it. Give me 1 thing in The Return that you haven't seen Lynch do before. Then tell me again how he doesn't deliver to expectations.
Wait, so The Return would be more daring if it were like a 16-year-old fanciful French romantic comedy? By that standard, you've won the argument. I am clearly not willing to judge Lynch as critically as you are.
It seems your argument is that a truly gutsy artist would completely reinvent himself as a septuagenarian, even if it in no way related to the world in which his work takes place. Well, I gotta admit, "Twin Peaks: Amelie Walk With Me" would be pretty gutsy. Heck, "Twin Peaks: Fire On The Dance Floor" would take some serious balls, too, especially if Lynch turned Agent Cooper into a down-on-his-luck tap-dancer and opened it as a Broadway musical. Maybe it'd even be great. I guess we'll never know. For some strange reason that I can't quite put my finger on, though, I'm kind of OK with that.
In the meantime, I'll start taking a more critical approach to all the forms of art I enjoy. Here's hoping Don DeLillo's next novel is Twilight fan fiction. And if it isn't, I'll just say he's always lacked "intellectual depth" -- and I was an idiot to keep reading him anyway.
Since this thread has gotten a little heavy I thought I'd lighten the mood a little with this
And this
For those interested in "art house films" or video art in general, UBU is a good place to wander and mingle.
For those interested in "art house films" or video art in general, UBU is a place to mingle.
Great website!
You can watch Lynch's short film, "Premonitions Following an Evil Deed" shot on an original hand cranked Cinematographe camera that the Lumiere brothers used way back in the day. Very Twin Peak"ish".
Fire walk with