Jan. 22, 1996

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Lynch is probably one of the oddest directors ever to come out of the Hollywood production line. Lynch was born on January 20, 1946 in Missoula, Montana. He started out in films with a short feature called The Alphabet (1968). Later, he made a much longer short, The Grandmother (1970), and than over a five-year period, he created his first feature-length film, Eraserhead (1977). The film has garnered a strong cult following and has desplayed some of Lynch's visual talents, including the nightmarish dream sequences and the dark and sinister black-and-white cinematography. Mel Brooks saw the film and decided Lynch was the perfect choice to direct The Elephant Man (1980), a biography on the life of John Merrick, a deformed man who spent the good portion of his life as a circus freak. The film was a critical and financial success.

Lynch was offered to direct the third Star Wars installement, but opted to advance his script for Ronnie Rocket. However, the project never got off the ground. Lynch also waded into troubled waters with producer Dino De Laurentis, over the film adaptation of Frank Herbert's epic, sci-fi novel Dune (1984). The movie was released in a drastically short form in comparison to the novel. In a way, it was not really a Lynch film and the movie was a box-office faliure. He came back with the visually stunning, Kafka-esque Blue Velvet (1986), a mystery which Lynch describes as "The Hardy Boys Go to Hell." It also showcased an incredible come-back performance from Dennis Hopper as the psychotic Frank Booth, one of the best screen villains ever. The film garnered a huge critical and public reaction, many people thinking the film was either sick or beautiful.

In 1990, Lynch embarked on a television series, made from the same mold as Blue Velvet, called Twin Peaks. He also released his fifth film, Wild at Heart, which could best be described as a road-trip from hell. As for the series, it had a strong cult following, like many of Lynch's work, but it dropped in the ratings and was eventually cancelled. Then in 1992, Lynch closed the series with a Twin Peaks movie, that was greeted with boos at the Cannes Film Festival and recieved critical ennui here in America. Now, the question is, after this extremely muddled production, will Lynch ever grace us with his presance again?

My rating on a scale of 1 to 10: 7

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