Hi everyone!
This occured to me the other day, I'm not saying there's definite connection between The Return and Inland Empire, but there are a couple of things I do find intriguing.
Firstly, the arm's reference to the little girl down the lane. It isn't quite referred to as such in IE but it did put my in mind of a certain monologue by Grace Zabriske in that film:
"A little boy went out to play. When he opened his door, he saw the world. As he passed through the doorway, a ghost—a reflection—evil—was born. Evil was born and followed the boy . . . And, the variation. A little girl went out to play. Lost in the marketplace as if half-born. Then, not through the marketplace—you see that, don't you?—but through the alley behind the marketplace. This is the way to the palace. But... it isn't something you remember."
Spookily, it seems to relate to The Return quite well, however unintentionally.
Also, Lynch introduced screenings of Inland Empire with a quote from the Upanishads (and also used the quote at the head of his chapter on IE in 'Catching the Big Fish'):
"We are like the spider. We weave our life and then move along in it. We are like the dreamer who dreams and then lives in the dream. This is true for the entire universe."
As I say, I don't know how intenional or not these links are but it's just some interesting food for thought!
Absoutely! I immediately thought of the same thing when Audrey uttered those words. I think there are actually many connections to Inland Empire. Here are but a few:
- The homicidal Polish accountant
- The multiplicity of Laura Dern characters
- Dougie's and Janey-E's life is not so different from that of the family in Rabbits-- endless repetition of domestic routines. And Laura Dern's circumstance in InlandeEmpire--trapped in the home of Rabbits after mysteriously arriving there via a soundstage for On High in Blue Horizons ? This struck me as parallel to Dale's return to Dougie Jone's life.
- I actually think the end credits of Inland Empire are the closest connection to The Return . They represented the first time, in Lynch's career (as far as I am aware), that he experimented with his new brand of weird auto-intertextual pastiche-- Laura Harring (Mulholland Drive ) makes a cameo seated beside Justin Theroux (Adam Kesher), and, IIRC the third woman in that room bears so close a resemblance (IMO) to Patricia Arquette in Lost Highway that it's hard to not see this as deliberate. Indeed, the final line of the film is delivered by the one-legged woman in much the same manner as the "Silencio!" that closes Mulholland Drive.
The Return , IMO, seizes this pastiche aesthetic and runs away with it. Nearly every episode (and darn near every scene) seems to explore or play with an image from Lynch's prior works-- from the short films, sculptures and paintings to the wide-release feature films.
The question that's nagging me is whether this new direction in Lynch's style is interesting or navel-gazing.... I'm such a fan of Lynch that I thrilled to it, but I'm sensitive to the position of critics who have questioned the extent to which self-borrowing is recycling for want of new ideas ... Arguably, he's actually weaving together these self-borrowings into new dreamscapes... but exploring dream world/trauma/psychosis has been Lynch's M.O. ("That's Modus Oper-an-dei!") for 20 years now (i.e., since Lost Highway.... The Straight Story notwithstanding...) Maybe it's his last, best trick.
I'm interested to hear what other Lynch buffs think about these connections.
- I actually think the end credits of Inland Empire are the closest connection to The Return . They represented the first time, in Lynch's career (as far as I am aware), that he experimented with his new brand of weird auto-intertextual pastiche-- Laura Harring (Mulholland Drive ) makes a cameo seated beside Justin Theroux (Adam Kesher), and, IIRC the third woman in that room bears so close a resemblance (IMO) to Patricia Arquette in Lost Highway that it's hard to not see this as deliberate. Indeed, the final line of the film is delivered by the one-legged woman in much the same manner as the "Silencio!" that closes Mulholland Drive.
Yeah, I remember thinking at the time of IE's release that the end credits almost seemed like a goodbye to film, and its true he hasn't made a feature since. The guy sawing wood I took as a reference to Twin Peaks.
This might be stretching things too far, especially as Lynch hasn't said anything along these lines that I recall, but he does believe in the idea of the Unified Field, so I wonder if with IE and The Return if he's starting to see his own work as a Unified Field in itself? Hence the inter-textual references - it's all part of ine great big world/story/body of work.
It's just occured to me that part of Wild at Heart was set in fictional Big Tuna, Texas, and that Odessa does not seem a million miles away from Big Tuna in look and sensibility from the little of it we get to see.
And the body on Carrie Page's sofa puts me in mind of the Yellow Man and Dorothy's husband in Blue Velvet. Or even the body found on the bed in Mulholland Drive.
As has also been noted, Major Briggs' face floating in space seems very much a callback to Eraserhead.
There could be nothing but coincidence in any of this, but it is striking that The Return was made and released during the period where The Art Life was released and Room to Live is imminent in its release. Could Lynch be in caught in the thrall of a big state of reminiscence?
This might be stretching things too far, especially as Lynch hasn't said anything along these lines that I recall, but he does believe in the idea of the Unified Field, so I wonder if with IE and The Return if he's starting to see his own work as a Unified Field in itself? Hence the inter-textual references - it's all part of ine great big world/story/body of work.
Could be.
Your idea reminds me of how Isaac Asimov, towards the end of his career, integrated the Galactic Empire, Foundation series and the Robot novels into one over-arching story thread.
😉
- /< /\ /> -
Totally agree. I just rewatched Mulholland Drive last night and a great deal of the tone, visuals, thematic elements plug right into where we ended up with TP: The Return. Certainly the story arc is very much like Cooper's shift in identity in the last episode but that is just one of many connections. Just look at the two characters Naomi Watts plays in the movie and in the latest series: Janey-E could often be almost a stand-in for Betty in the Mulholland Drive!
The way I am starting to view most of Lynch's work is that most of it is all an interconnected exploration. Certain aspects may be emphasized depending on the story, but the color palette (metaphorically speaking) are pretty much the same.
Totally agree. I just rewatched Mulholland Drive last night and a great deal of the tone, visuals, thematic elements plug right into where we ended up with TP: The Return. Certainly the story arc is very much like Cooper's shift in identity in the last episode but that is just one of many connections. Just look at the two characters Naomi Watts plays in the movie and in the latest series: Janey-E could often be almost a stand-in for Betty in the Mulholland Drive!
The way I am starting to view most of Lynch's work is that most of it is all an interconnected exploration. Certain aspects may be emphasized depending on the story, but the color palette (metaphorically speaking) are pretty much the same.
It's strange, in that I knew Lynch explores certain themes (dream states, identity etc) regularly and that spreads across his work, but I've never thought of him as meta or particularly self-referencing before. Its not something I think he's even commented on as far as I'm aware. But it seems to creep into IE (particularly the end credits) and definitely The Return. It's certainly a new colour on his palette.
Though Lynch addresses similar themes throughout his films I think each of his films is a progression and he never does the same thing twice. Even where it seems that he is saying the same thing such as the Los Angeles trio of Lost Highway, Mulholland Dr. and Inland Empire where he examines changing identity and persona in all three films each film is unique in the examination of changing identity. In Twin Peaks The Return Lynch as borrowed from his own and other people's visual media representations and past themes and created a new work of art for television. This again will not be repeated by Lynch. Each representation of similar themes is unique when Lynch is involved.
Though Lynch addresses similar themes throughout his films I think each of his films is a progression and he never does the same thing twice. Even where it seems that he is saying the same thing such as the Los Angeles trio of Lost Highway, Mulholland Dr. and Inland Empire where he examines changing identity and persona in all three films each film is unique in the examination of changing identity. In Twin Peaks The Return Lynch as borrowed from his own and other people's visual media representations and past themes and created a new work of art for television. This again will not be repeated by Lynch. Each representation of similar themes is unique when Lynch is involved.
Oh yeah, I'm certainly not suggesting he's a one trick pony, far from it; more that he has certain themes which he likes to explore across his work i.e. dream states, identity.
Your idea reminds me of how Isaac Asimov, towards the end of his career, integrated the Galactic Empire, Foundation series and the Robot novels into one over-arching story thread.
😉
- /< /\ /> -
There was a really interesting article in the UK SFX magazine a couple of months ago about Stephen King and how a lot of his work forms a kind of multi-verse sharing characters and places (in particular the location of Derry).
Though Lynch addresses similar themes throughout his films I think each of his films is a progression and he never does the same thing twice. Even where it seems that he is saying the same thing such as the Los Angeles trio of Lost Highway, Mulholland Dr. and Inland Empire where he examines changing identity and persona in all three films each film is unique in the examination of changing identity. In Twin Peaks The Return Lynch as borrowed from his own and other people's visual media representations and past themes and created a new work of art for television. This again will not be repeated by Lynch. Each representation of similar themes is unique when Lynch is involved.
Oh yeah, I'm certainly not suggesting he's a one trick pony, far from it; more that he has certain themes which he likes to explore across his work i.e. dream states, identity.
Hi Andrew and Chris-- thanks for a fascinating discussion.
I couldn't agree more that Lynch has explored a common set of themes--each time, in a new way-- throughout his career. But I do think there's a case to be made that The Return reflects a new turn toward auto-quotation (or an extension of the Inland Empire credit-reel sequence) that could be a a productive point of departure for an analysis of what The Return is doing thematically. I suspect that "meta"-level analysis and textual analysis could be fruitfully intertwined here... but I think we're a ways off, as yet, from articulating how or why the themes Lynch explores in The Return seem to so readily spill over from the textual container he's situated them in ...
Here's a hypothesis: perhaps the career-retrospective gestures have a good deal to do with the deconstruction of identity, memory and agency that is what Cooper's side of the ending seemed to suggest (to me)?
Strikes me as a very compelling corollary set of (highly personal themes) to contrast the exploration of grief, mourning and the cyclical motion of trauma he achieved with the apotheosis of the Palmer family. Certainly, both the "surprise ending" to Part 18 and the end-credits sequence of Inland Empire seem to represent a moment (via the "Chalifont" house) where the contents of the text "spill over" into a more expansive space. [Rather uncannily like Cooper's fall into the purple-sea castle, no?]
Thoughts?
I think in the Return Lynch as probably considered whether this will be his last big film/television production since his last film Inland Empire was 2006 and so he has created a programme that combines his favourite themes and his favourite actors from the last 40 years and developed these themes whilst also creating something new in the process that allows the audience to decide what is happening in the narrative. What parts are real, what parts are happening inside someone's head, what parts might be a dream, even some parts that reflect actual reality that are then placed in the fictional narrative. You could say that Twin Peaks The Return is the fourth film in a quartet of films following on from Lost Highway, Mulholland Dr. and Inland Empire relating to manufactured towns and changing identities if you class Las Vegas as a manufactured town similar to Los Angeles as a city that manufactures dreamscapes.
Let's not forget that David Lynch did not write Twin Peaks on his own. It was co-written by Mark Frost. It is not all his own work in the same way that Stephen King is responsible for his universe.
Let's not forget that David Lynch did not write Twin Peaks on his own. It was co-written by Mark Frost. It is not all his own work in the same way that Stephen King is responsible for his universe.
Oh absolutely, and to say less would be a complete diservice to Mark Frost. I think with the Return, it does ultimately feel more Lynchy than the original seasons. Understandable in that Lynch has been much more involved overall this time.
But there also seems to be quotes from Lynch's work all over The Return and at times seem quite specific as to make some of their being there seem very intentional (whether they are or not remains to be seen).
I can't imagine Frost coming to the work wanting to specifically quote from the Lynch cannon; not that he'd have any issues with it I think but it wouldn't make sense for Frost to say 'hey David, we could reference Eraserhead here at this point.' And I don't think Lynch would reference old works for the sake of it, more if he thought it made some kind of sense to/for the world he was trying to create.
I've noticed Lynch has been mentioned a lot more than Frost when discussing The Return and it's not really fair to Frost's contributions I'm sure. But I think a lot of the reason for this is that The Return does feel very Lynchian at heart and, with the quotes fron his work, seems very personally so too. And as stated above feels a lot closer to Lost Highway, Mulholland Highway and Inland Empire than previous Twin Peaks.
It's been said Lynch had nothing to do with The Secret History, and I could believe that TSH could work as Frost's personal take on the Twin Peaks mythology/world. As a trade off, I could reasonably see Lynch using at least the form/style/themes/mise-en-scene to give his personal take on the Twin Peaks world. Maybe Frost is the story, Lynch is the world the story takes place in, and they bleed into each other at certain points. Until one of them opens up on the initial creative process for The Return we won't know. But its fascinating to discuss.
With reference to IE, it does feel like Lynch with the emotionally heightened resolution, the women in trouble saved, safe, whole, and then the references to previous works over the end credits, it almost felt like he thought at the time it was going to be his last feature film (which it still is, to be fair) and he was either saying goodbye, to us or the work, and it felt like some kind of summing up.
With The Return it almost feels like he's trying to work out a context for his work, whether it does operate as a 'unified field' as it were, or if there is a larger world that all his works operate in.
Fire walk with