Summary:
As FBI agents investigate strange murders that might be connected, Laura Palmer goes about her daily routine, unaware that tragedy will soon befall her.
My Thoughts:
I’m a huge David Lynch fan (“Mulholland Drive”, “Eraserhead”), and while unabashedly love the first season and a half of the groundbreaking TV show Twin Peaks, it took me a long time to get through the latter half of the second season of the aforementioned show because it sort of started to go off the rails when Lynch wasn’t steering the ship. Just to give you a sense of timing: it took me about two weeks to get through the first season and a half (first eighteen episodes), and then after I found out who killed Laura Palmer and why, it took me almost a year to finish those final twelve episodes. I did finally finish those less-than-stellar episodes, and I was surprised to find that despite my relative disappointment with most of season two, the series finale was pretty great, and it left me eagerly awaiting this film, and then completing my Twin Peaks journey with Twin Peaks: The Return (I’m only a few episodes in so far, but it’s fantastic). I was so excited after the season two finale that I jumped right from that episode to this movie (like I’m sure many of the hardcore fans of the series did when this film hit theaters).
As a whole, I’m sort of conflicted about this movie. I think it’s a very good companion piece to Twin Peaks, as it tells the story of Laura Palmer’s final days leading up to her murder from Laura’s perspective, revealing all of the information we learned about Laura and Twin Peaks in an easily digestible two-hour-and-fifteen minute chunk. In a lot of ways, I like this film: any time that I get to visit Twin Peaks with David Lynch as my guide, I’m happy. At the same time, I’m not really sure if this film needs to exist, as it doesn’t reveal any new information, and it essentially spoils the whole story of the first two seasons. The only people who can really appreciate this movie for what it is are those who have seen the show, and those people already know everything that’s going to happen in this movie, they just haven’t seen it from Laura’s perspective.
From a filmmaking perspective, I think this is one of Lynch’s weaker films because there is so much prior knowledge needed in order to understand what’s going on. You need to know who Bob is; who the agents are; what the Black Lodge is; you need to understand the way the town of Twin Peaks works in general, and you won’t be able to do that if you haven’t watched the show. Furthermore, while the show Twin Peaks hints at a lot of deeper metaphysical meanings, this movie only sets up those themes, it doesn’t actually explore them any deeper. If you look at Lynch’s other movies, even the ones that are thematically obtuse (like “Lost Highway”) still try to infuse some kind of deeper themes that relate to the universal existential crisis. This movie doesn’t do that; it just sets up events and lets them play out. And while the events that happen on screen compelled me, I honestly can’t say I’d have cared if I hadn’t have known what was coming.
Verdict:
If you’ve seen Twin Peaks, you might as well watch this. It’s not bad, and if you like Twin Peaks, there’s enough weird stuff in this to make it worth a watch (plus David Bowie makes an appearance). If you haven’t seen Twin Peaks, then don’t watch this movie; it won’t make any sense and it will spoil one of the best TV shows ever made.
END NOTE (SPOILERS FOR TWIN PEAK SEASON TWO FINALE): I’m trying to imagine how some diehard fan of Twin Peaks would’ve felt seeing this in theaters on opening day, expecting some kind of answers as to what happened to Agent Dale Cooper, who, at the end of season two was trapped in the Black Lodge. I’d imagine that I would’ve been very annoyed that this was a prequel that answered no questions about his fate. I’m so very glad I was not one of those people who had to wait twenty-five years for Twin Peaks: The Return.
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