Alright let’s not mess around…
- After a bizarre dream sequence (Was it a dream?) a meek guy with big hair and what seems to be groceries gingerly walks to his small apartment in a dilapidated complex located in a run down area… for about 11 minutes.
- When he arrives he is told by a neighbour that someone wants him to go to dinner. These are the first words in the film and everything seems reasonably normal – if very boring.
- The guy goes to dinner. We learn his name is Henry, he is a printer by trade but it presently on holidays. His inviter is Mary, and dinner is at her folk’s home. Mary’s Father is loud but friendly and her Mother direct and seemingly suspicious.
- Dinner is small, unruly and oozing, (rather like Madonna through the 90s).
- After dinner is abandoned Mother asks “Did you and Mary have sexual intercourse?” Twice.
- Mary is pregnant. “You MUST get married.”
- (No on-screen pregnancy or birth.) “Baby” home now, we only see its head and long neck. Looks like a slimy dinosaur (a T-Rex I decided) crossed with a skinless sheep’s head. 100% inhuman. Baby gasps, gurgles and whines… as babies do. Mother, Father and “Baby” all live in Henry’s apartment.
- Mary is at wit’s end, moves home for some sleep. “Baby” seems sick.
- Fuck knows what is happening. I have given up. After a ridiculous mime act by a square-cheeked adult Shirley Temple wannabe Henry’s head just fell off and was picked up and carried by a young boy to the offices of a Pencil manufacturer. We then find it is a dream – but isn’t. WELL IS IT?
That’s the long version of the notes I made, I actually wrote “Fuck knows what is happening. I have given up”.
This film was pure spam from start to finish. I could care less if it is visually striking and inspired lunacy, as it said on the DVD cover. You can put a bow on a steaming turd and tell people what inspired your visually striking work, just don’t expect me to give a flying fuck.
Hang on I’m off now… Just because it would be awful to have a baby with a Dinosaur-Sheep’s head doesn’t mean I have to care: if it happens in a crappy film.
And make no mistake this is one crappy film.
We can talk about genius all you like, and perhaps in latter efforts Mr David Lynch showed some evidence that he is just that. But I could write this thing in 3 minutes flat with a crayon and a copy of the white pages… Let’s see:
“A guy dives off the high board into a pizza. Pepperoni slivers stick to his face and become portals to another dimension staffed with Nazis who ride unicycles and read poetry in between kissing each other.
The guy keeps the Nazi memories in a shoebox that he stores in his ear, only when other people look upon it all they see is carpet samples. Someone who yells for no reason sells the guy a newspaper with headline $4 turtles eat London… The guy gazes into the vacant corner of the room for 11 minutes thinking silently only in French, while in his roof beetles gnaw on the flesh of a dead possum – who smiles and does his taxes.”
Where’s my award!?!
I know Cronenberg and Lynch are seen as the loony student’s choice, but at least Cronenberg makes films with a vague narrative, Lynch throws 27 ridiculous scenarios together and gets called visionary. Well Jack all I saw in my vision was 88 minutes of disconnected trash.
Apparently Lynch claims that no-one ever gets “it”, and he refuses to tell anyone what his version of “it” is. That sounds like a clueless person saying “I know but I ain’t tellin'”, when in reality they have no clue themselves.
Well here’s a newsflash. I alone know exactly what Eraserhead represents.
A.
Tremendous.
Waste.
Of.
My.
Fucking.
Time.
Final Rating – 2.5 – 10. When I started my so-called “career” 14 years ago I thought I was the duck’s nuts. Looking back I feel very sorry for anyone that I thought I was actually helping. I wonder if Mr Lynch feels sorry for people who watch this?
He should.
