Anything For a Cheap Laugh

I saw Eraserhead when it first came out (1977.)

Eraserhead nauseated me.

Thereafter, I avoided David Lynch, ignoring the Whaddagenius rants from media & friends.

But, yesterday David Lynch died.

Reappraisal and possible redemption seemed appropriate, so I watched the much-touted Mulholland Drive.

I liked it more than I thought I would.



Mulholland Drive has two parts. The first part is a dream; the second part is a narrative about the girl who has the dream.

It is impossible to capture a dream with a real-time camera (though you might be able to do it with animation), but I will say Lynch does manage to capture the feeling of a dream in that moment after you first wake up when your overheated brain is struggling to impose a narrative on all those rapidly evaporating images.

And Naomi Watts is very, very good in the role.

I can see why Lynch assumed cult status.

Mulholland Drive is very surreal. But surrealism edges into horror, and I’ve never been a big fan of horror movies. The only directors in that genre whose works I enjoy are Ari Aster & Jordan Peele, but that’s because they use horror as a vehicle for social criticism.

And though I used to read a fair amount of horror, I find I can’t anymore. It’s as though as I’ve aged, my boundaries have become more porous somehow. Contagion by an unspeakable Big Bad has become an actual threat. So, I’m not gonna go out of my way to watch anything else by David Lynch.



Also, Unity Mitford’s Hitler diaries just got published.

I’m a big Mitford Sisters fan.

My favorite Mitford Sister is Decca (of course)—at whose North Oakland home I once had tea because Marybeth was a pal of Benjie Treuhaft’s first wife. At some point, Decca herself wandered downstairs in a battered bathrobe to join the merriment. What I recall best was her foghorn voice with its wonderful U accent—“gel” (hard g) for “girl”—which got louder and louder as she poured teacup after teacup of gin for herself while the rest of us dabbled our tiny spoons in Earl Grey.

Decca also wrote me a lovely postcard after Birth Tales was published.

Reams have been written about the relationship between Decca and Unity, who shared a bedroom growing up. The bedroom was divided into a Communist part (Decca) and a fascist part (Unity.) I wish I could remember the exact line Unity used to inform Decca that, while she would not hesitate to kill Decca's Communist husband for the sake of Nazism, she hoped she and Decca could still be friends.

The Big Question that haunts historians: Did Unity fuck Hitler?

On the basis of the diary extracts—thank you, Daily Mail!—I am guessing not.



In other news, passed the IRS certification test with flying colors. Whew! 😀

But the BIG news is that RTT has decided to run for a seat on the Ithaca City Council. It’s an election that can be won with just a few hundred votes, and honestly, I think he’s got a good shot at winning it. RTT is the best networker I have ever met. He’s really good at sending those interpersonal pseudopods out. And he thinks politically.

Chattered away for two hours with BB at a café in Montgomery that had better coffee & more charm than any place I’ve found in New Paltz, so go figure.

BB amused me no end by quipping (in regards to what, I cannot remember), I saw all the red flags, but I thought they were decorations. (Great line!)

Went off to the Y for my modest but effective workout.

Wandered home to find Iggy Icky in the kitchen packing up to return to NYC. Traded quickfire jokes with Icky in the kitchen, all the while wondering, Why are you bantering with this creep? He tried to freeze you to death! But apparently, I’ll do anything for a cheap laugh.

So, all in all, it was a good day. Though maybe not for David Lynch.