Império dos Sonhos

I first saw "Inland Empire" in early 2007 and opted not to write about it mainly because I really didn't know how I felt about the film (or video, if you're into semantics) after I saw it. I went to the late night show, was almost certainly inebriated, went with a group of friends (at this point I still had a social life), and remember little about the screening except that I enjoyed the film and appreciated it on some level or the other. Well, I'm glad I didn't attempt to write about "Inland Empire" based on that viewing because my feelings are drastically different this time around. What I found to be a fascinatingly incomprehensible nightmare-on-video the first time I saw it, what I found to be an extremely nonsensical film overall, I now feel is one of the most important and greatest artistic works of the decade, and nowhere near as flawed and incomprehensible as I initially thought. I'm not going to attempt an analysis of the film, greater minds have done that already, so I'll stick to a simple review of it.

Perhaps "Inland Empire" does recycle elements of Lynch's previous work. I find it a less powerful experience than his 2001 masterpiece "Mulholland Dr." which with every viewing comes closer to toppling "Vertigo", my favorite film since I first saw it at age 12 or 13. I do think the video is used badly at some points in the film. It's a testament to Lynch's skill as director and cinematographer (and camera operator) that he was able to achieve this sort of thing with a dated, mediocre digital camera, but on rare occasions in the film, particularly during outdoor daytime shots, the poor quality of the camera itself isn't conquered by Lynch's creativity and skill in using it as well as it can possibly be used. However, other than that very small problem I really struggle to find anything I would cut out of the film. Considering its length, that's really something. In fact, I'm dying to see "More Things that Happened", one of the DVD extras which features over seventy minutes of footage shot for the project and not included in the final cut of the film. The film is, surprisingly for something shot with such primitive digital technology, formally elegant and consistently well-shot. What would Van Gogh have done with a set of cheap crayons and color pencils? The film makes fascinating use of color and light, and boasts possibly the best use of close-ups since Leone. These are even uglier, in a good way.

The most common criticism of "Inland Empire" seems to be that it's a total mess, a bunch of nonsensical weird goings-on strung together and put out for pseudo-intellectuals to dissect in their setting of choice (the average pseudo-intellectual favors either the internet or the great coffee shop which isn't a chain... yet, the cool pseudo-intellectuals enjoy the sort of bar which frequently doubles as an art gallery, but that's besides the point). This is both true and untrue, and I suspect the more times I see the film the more I'll see it as untrue. Where the truth of these claims lies, mostly, is in the fact that, as a fellow IMDb user notes, the film doesn't just shun narrative tradition but acts as if such a thing never existed. However, to say there are no themes or emotions being expressed, to say there are no stories being told in the film, seems to me not a matter of opinion but simply incorrect, and indicates an extraordinarily narrow-minded and simplistic view of cinema as a form of linear storytelling and nothing else.

While it does not have a 'plot', "Inland Empire" has a story. In fact it has several stories to tell, including that of actress Nikki Grace (Laura Dern), that of a battered housewife (Laura Dern), and that of a hooker working Hollywood boulevard (Laura Dern). There's also a giant rabbit sitcom and a Polish prostitute. Most of these strands start out relatively linearly and the film is mostly overall quite easy to follow for more than an hour of its running time, standard Lynch surrealism excepted. The film grows gradually more bizarre as the stories interact and occasionally merge with each other, the themes they have in common becoming clearer in some instances and less clear in others. The narratives all have great payoff as the film draws to a close. I didn't understand everything in "Inland Empire" and I'm pretty sure we're not supposed to, but it's really not even close to being the sort of deliberately distancing, deliberately obscure sort of thing Godard sometimes does. It doesn't mistake obfuscation for art.

I can safely say I can't recall one dream I've had which didn't do exactly what "Inland Empire" did: start out as a linear narrative and then spiral out of control (my dream last night about Kirk and Spock's love lives in Starfleet turning into a spectacular time travel government conspiracy Tribble-centric crossover with "Star Wars" and "Lost" being just one example). The brilliance of Lynch's work here is that he was able to capture that and to control it, to explore themes with it, to express emotions with it. That's rare talent, that's rare skill at work. It doesn't hurt that his is a more interesting and freakish mind than most of ours. "Inland Empire" doesn't seek to tell a simple, straightforward story. Criticizing it for not doing so indicates either misunderstanding or a narrow-minded view of cinema. As a formal experiment and as an overall achievement "Inland Empire" is up there with Lynch's very best and as a result with the very best of cinema in general.

No seriously. WTF. Ignore my rating because a movie like this defies any kind of a linear rating scale. My real rating is: WTF stars. Everyone else can write their absurd words about the film but the only thing a normal honest person can say after watching this is... what the actual f**k did I just watch?

Seriously, watch the film then come back to this review and tell me it isn't the most accurate summation of the film on here.

Side note: Laura Dern seriously does give an incredible performance. No one quite captures the true essence of WTF like Laura. She really does elevate the film to higher levels of "WTF-ness" than it ever would achieve on it's own.

For real though. What the actual f**k?

I saw INLAND EMPIRE at the Venice Film Festival world premiere last month. I want to keep this review short due to the fact that writing in great detail about this film is useless. INLAND EMPIRE is an experience. An experience not to be written about but to be FELT. It is David Lynch's definitive work. It's everything he has ever wanted to put into a film and it's completely free from anyone else's taming influence. The film is suffocating, dark and endless yet paradoxically contains some of the director's funniest and lightest scenes. I was frightened, uneasy, overwhelmed and moved. My emotions were thrown into disarray several times during which I lost all sense of appropriate reaction. Do not expect the mystery of this film to be solved, but expect it to be finished. Do not expect your head to understand the resolution but expect that your heart and intuition will.

If you cannot decide whether to see this film or not, I implore you to get up and go. Whether or not you enjoy it, you will never see a film like this again. I also implore you to see it IN THE CINEMA. Do not wait to see it on DVD because the experience won't be half as extraordinary.

For those who felt Lynch's last film, Mulholland Dr., was too easy, I present to you Inland Empire. The director takes the whole dream (or nightmare) narrative a step further and makes the narrative even more fragmented and impossible to follow. There might not really be much of a narrative at all. The recognizable plot begins with Laura Dern as an aging actress, having spent a while as a housewife, trying to re-enter the movie industry. She wins a role and, during filming, she starts to fall for her co-lead (Justin Theroux). Which is strange, given that the film is about a straying housewife. Soon, real life and screen life become completely blurred, until the actress only exists in her fictional life. Maybe. God knows at this point. The film becomes completely incomprehensible by any conventional standards. Which doesn't in any way mean that it's worthless. Like all Lynch films, Inland Empire is deeply hypnotic, often haunting and occasionally downright scary. I wish there were a little more sense to it so I could connect a bit more. And the fact that the film runs for nearly three hours; it's easy to get restless. I think a good number of people are going to find this to be Lynch's folly. It is disappointing, especially as we've waited five years since Mulholland Dr., probably his best film, but there are a few of Lynch's movies that I like less than this.

An actress's perception of reality becomes increasingly distorted as she finds herself falling for her co-star in a remake of an unfinished Polish production that was supposedly cursed.

David Lynch is an inspiration for those who want to do their own thing. He started with some creepy, surreal short films, moved on to the bizarre "Eraserhead" and has made numerous strange films since, seemingly with little regard for what critics or box office receipts say. While he has done some stories that border on normal, there is always an element of the bizarre, and trying to make sense of a plot in a Lynch film is an intellectual landmine. I fell in love with Lynch after seeing "Lost Highway" and "Twin Peaks", but find it hard to justify my love.

"Inland Empire" continues the madness. Opening with a beautiful shot of a record player in black and white, then of a couple making love... we are soon greeted by a family of anthropomorphized rabbits, and two gentlemen having a discussion in some foreign language, apparently Polish. How any of these things are connected is unclear thus far, and that is only the first ten minutes of a three hour film. How well they make sense by the end is hard to say.

The film goes "normal" after that, through we enter a world with odd camera angles, mismatched close-ups, and conversations that do not flow... a murder accusation, an agent on the telephone... and all words spoken in an unusual manner. Almost in an amateur way, but clearly professionals trying to be amateur, with emotions not matching the events. And then there is William H. Macy as an announcer...

On top of already being a lengthy and interesting film, the DVD comes with a second disc with several hours of supplemental material. My only complaint is that, despite all this, the film only has subtitles available in French. I like subtitles. Maybe I am in the minority, but as a visual learner, I follow a story better when I can read along. And I cannot read French well.

Lynch veteran Laura Dern stars (and co-produces), which is beneficial to the film, because she knows exactly what sort of weirdness Lynch is looking for. I think the film fails, or at least falls short, though. The running time is a bit too long and it is hard to stay focused for this length. Also, the film just does not seem to have enough. While starting out strong, it gets slow and monotonously as it carries on, and any intelligent point hidden in there is missed by the audience's boredom. I appreciated the inclusion of the randomness, such as the "Locomotion", but of all the Lynch films I have seen (which is many) this is my least favorite.

If you must see every David Lynch film, see this film. If you can survive without that goal, do not see this film. I cannot recommend it to anyone except his biggest fans because everyone else will be lost, bored and leave with a lower opinion of the man than he deserves.