David Lynch's Lost Highway

March 12, 1997

As the closing credits to David Lynch's new film Lost Highway began to roll, a man sitting two seats away from me asked aloud, to no one in particular - but definitely in search of enlightenment, "What was that about?" A man a few rows in front of us turned around, shrugged, and looking resigned to oblivion said, "I don't know."

A litany of mystified responses isn't unusual at a David Lynch film screening, but not since Eraserhead (1978), his feature film debut, has Lynch given audiences such a disjointed and logic-defying nightmare world. Lynch co-wrote Lost Highway with Barry Gifford, his co-writer for Wild at Heart (1990).

Bill Pullman, as Fred Madison, plays a feckless musician who is married to Patricia Arquette (Renee Madison) a scheming femme fatale. Their life starts to unravel through a series of strange occurrences: a cryptic message about the death of a shadowy figure, being videotaped while they sleep and have sex, infidelity, and the appearance of Robert Blake (as the Mystery Man, in white face and sans eyebrows) as evil incarnate.

Then the story careens out of orbit. Fred (now on death row - you'll have to find out why for yourself) is transformed and becomes Pete Dayton, played by Balthazar Getty. Pete falls for his own femme fatale (Alice) played again by Patricia Arquette as a different character, a blonde analog to Renee. It's great fun to watch Lynch explode cinematic logic, especially if you remember Luis Bunuel's That Obscure Object of Desire (1977). Instead of having two women play the same character, as Bunuel did, Lynch has Arquette ... well, I won't spoil it for you.

Add Robert Loggia (Mr. Eddy) as the sinister hood, Henry Rollins as a prison guard, Richard Pryor, Jack Nance, Gary Busey, Marilyn Manson, et al., and you have the typical coterie of Lynch grotesques we've come to expect. Include some magnificent experimental film techniques, as segues between the major shifts in the film, and the nightmare world is complete.

Lost Highway is David Lynch's most interesting film since Blue Velvet, and certainly his most challenging since Eraserhead.

Ray Gunn Virus
A.k.a.: Ray Gunn Virus; Mr. Ray Gunn Virus, Sir; Shinygodhead; J. Alvarez; sometimes even old plain Jorge (go ahead say whore-hey) never mind George will do. Stuff he like to do someday: Make a living out of writing "junk and stuff" and going places and seeing things ...