Twin Peaks - Fire Walk with Me

Rating:
Summary: David Lynch is a [...]
Review: If you liked this movie you are a pretentious tool and probably think you're the 'movie guy' at your school or job.

Daid Lynch [...] with a passion, this whole movie is a head ache. And if you think it's genius to have a guy talk on a phone while taking a crap and watching a Hawaiian chick dance for him naked (wild at heart) you know nothing about movies and probably annoy everyone who knows you. Now don't get me wrong I like obscure, oddball movies as much as the next movie-school drop out, but there's a line between weird and stupid and Lynch crosses this line in almost all his movies. If I made a movie where there's a 5 minute scene of a guy feeding apple sauce to a chimp in a deserted circus, that doesn't make me an edgey genius that makes no compromises that makes me an idiot.

There's a scene where David Bowie storms into an office and starts yelling like a mad man for no reason and the scene ends with no more Bowie in the rest of flick. And there's a scene where Laura Palmer's father snaps at her for not washing her hands for dinner even though he told her to sit down at the dinner table right when she came in, and starts strangling her and yelling about her finger nails being dirty while the mother cries dramatically. These are just two examples of many long, boring scenes that go no where. That last scene i mentioned would be almost laughable if Lynch didn't take himself so seriously. I mean it could a premise for an old 'Kids in the Hall' skit. I didn't care when Laura Palmer got killed like she annoyed me with everybody else in the movie; except Harold Dean Stanton, he's always pretty cool.
Anyhow, This director tries way to hard to be weird and I for one can see right through him. The only good movies he made was 'Elephant Man' and 'Blue Velvet' so all you Lynch loving Eraserheads should get a hint and start following better filmmakers.



Rating:
Summary: Mysterious, Disturbing, Beautiful (SPOILERS!)
Review: I remember "Twin Peaks" from when I was a kid, meaning that I remember the hype surrounding the series when it came out, and the way its increasingly gratuitous weirdness eventually alienated all but the hardest-core fans. I remember those commercials in which you'd see the face of "BOB" morph into that of an owl, etc. It all looked really strange and occult and obscure. I was too young to get into it, but the fascination of the show kind of stuck with me through the years. Later I became a fan of Lynch's films, particularly the brilliant "Mulholland Dr.," and from time to time I'd think oh yeah, this was the "TP" guy, but the general unavailability of the series as a whole kept me away from it. (Which is why it's just plain stupid to stall the release of the second season of a show like this - especially when there are only two seasons total! But I digress.) Eventually I wound up borrowing the pilot and first season DVD from a friend. Guess what, I got addicted, so I had to "acquire" the second season online. I even read the (likewise generally unobtainable) "Secret Diary of Laura Palmer," a truly gripping and powerful piece of writing by (if I recall) David Lynch's daughter, which recounts in first person the gory details of Laura's years of abuse and torture at the hands of the mysterious entity known as BOB. Take out the supernatural elements in this book and you're left with a convincing case study of the psychological impact of incest, drug abuse, and secrecy.

After all this I felt prepared to see the film. It's probably ideally best to watch "Fire Walk With Me" last, as a capper. If you've watched the whole series you already know who killed Laura, and whether you have or not, "FWWM" will probably raise more questions than it answers - that's why we love it - but so much of it depends on the viewer's acquaintance with the show that it still makes sense to see the film last.

As with the show, the movie bears interpretation on many levels at once, and Lynch is always teasing you with suggestions of diverse "working theories." On the one hand, it often feels like a perfectly straightforward after-school special on the topics of sex, drugs and incest. There are hints that all the "supernatural" aspects are simply elaborate imaginary ways for Laura (and maybe her father) to deal with the unspeakable. Maybe there really is no BOB, as indeed shut-in Harold Smith remarks early on in the film - maybe he's just a cypher for Laura's father, rather than a demonic entity that possesses him to molest her.

And yet there's an equal insistence on the supernatural, with repeated references to the mysteries brought up in the series, as well as some new symbolism unique to the movie, e.g. the "blue rose." There are sections in which "FWWM" dissolves into abstract stream-of-consciousness-style hallucinations in the midst of what almost looked like it was going to be an ordinary narrative, most notably the bizzare segment at the Philadelphia headquarters in which Cooper splits in two, missing agent Philip Jeffries suddenly turns up out of nowhere and the next thing we know we're above the notorious "convenience store" with BOB, the Little Man From Another Place, the "Chalfonts" and others, all spewing typical symbolic rhetoric about formica tables and "Garmonbozia." It's extremely suggestive, but I doubt anybody really knows EXACTLY what it's about, Lynch included, although the references will stick in your head and tease you as you try to puzzle through them.

This is the secret of the undeniable fascination of the whole "TP" phenomenon, and much of Lynch's work. I've watched the hell out of "Mulholland Dr.," and every time my theory changes, and I actually doubt that there's any one all-purpose solution to the cluster of mysteries. There are various explanations for various events, sometimes mutually exclusive, but all seeming to relate to the same nexus of intrigue in some indeterminate sense. But Lynch never gives the secret away completely. He claims in interviews that he doesn't always know what his own symbols mean at the time, and that he's as shocked as anybody when he "figures them out." And actually, I believe him!

A common remark in these reviews, whether the reviewers have seen the series or not, regardless of how they interpret the story, is that this film stays with them and haunts them for hours afterwards. It has an undeniable archetypal power. It's definitely much darker than the series, which overemphasized the light comedy elements to appease tame network viewers, but after all, this IS the story of the brutal rape and murder of a teenage girl, and the film depicts this quite vividly.

Rating:
Summary: Brilliant movie, but...
Review: ...as a Lynch fan, a big pet peeve of mine is when people wish for a "director's cut" of this film, as in the review below. Lynch has had final cut on ALL his films except Dune, and so they all (except Dune) can be properly called director's cuts. FWWM as it stands is the version Lynch supervised and approves of. It's true that a lot of scenes ended up on the cutting room floor, but that's how movies are made. A rough cut is first assembled using everything, and the director and editor whittle it down from there. That said, Lynch has expressed interest in including the cut scenes in a FWWM DVD, but only as separate extras. He won't cut them into the film because he likes it as it is.

Rating:
Summary: New Hope For Fire Walk With Me - Director's Cut
Review: The following appeared at Moviehole.net:

There could be hope for those sad, sad, "Peaks" fans. Ah heck, I'm one of the Palmer brigade, my fingers are crossed tighter than a scout ties rope. All together Now : "Thru the darkness of Future Past the magician longs to see, one chants out between two worlds, Fire - walk with me".

Someone just flung me a business card for a shrink. Hmm.

Anyone familiar with David Lynch's "Twin Peaks : Fire Walk With Me" - the spin-off feature released a couple of years after the series ended - knows that it was cut to shreds and released with about an hour and a smidge missing.

In 2000, New Line went to Lynch and asked him if he would like to include the deleted scenes for the DVD release. He agreed to supply 17 cut scenes, but only if he could personally edit, transfer, and score each scene to match the same quality as the movie itself.

Suddenly, the studio goes back to Davo and tells him to hold off on restoring those lost scenes. There's some rights issues. And long story short : Those rights issues (among other probs) were going to hurt New Line's bank balance too much to bother with.

Since then, fans have been pestering anyone with a dollop of power about either re-issuing a disc with the lost stuff or at least getting a 'Director's Cut' out in other territories (It's not available at all in Australia, for one). All hope seem to lie with the French, studio MK2, who were keen on exploring this 'fan version'. At the end of the day though, the French version ended up having only a couple more extras (including some great artwork for the cover and box) than the stateside version. It just didn't come together.

The last we heard - December - MK2 were still toying with the idea of getting a Directors Cut out there. "MK2 is meeting with Lynch in the next few weeks to finish negotiations for the 2 Disc Collectors Edition of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. In these next few weeks, the fate will be decided if MK2 will be releasing Deleted Scenes for this DVD. The 2 Disc Set release has been pushed back to 2005 to allow for the final negotiations and to prepare additional extras for this release". Haven't heard anything since.

The folks at Dugpa.com noticed something interesting, and it might actually be a good sign for the FWWM DC - if even just for the Yoplait crowd.

On the French website, Telerama.fr, Lynch makes a specific mention to the Deleted Scenes Petition. Below is a rough translation:

David Lynch : I would do this for sentimental reasons. My friend, Jack Nance appeared in one of those deleted scenes. He's dead now and it would be a great tribute to him.

Nance, as you may recall, died suddenly and unexpectedly in December 1996 from an apparent internal head injury the morning after getting into a physical brawl at a donut shop with some roudy patrons. It was pretty shocking stuff.

Want to to hassle the MK2 crowd about releasing this special edition? Here's the digits you need.



Email : Here
Write : Médias & Régies Interactive

c/o Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me Deleted Scenes

55 rue Traversière

75012 Paris, France



Keep those hand add-ons crossed.


http://www.moviehole.net/news/4823.html

Rating:
Summary: Who Would Want to Kill Laura Palmer?
Review: Gee? I have a question? Who wouldn't? While watching the film I noticed that Laura is beaten, raped, and/or yelled at by almost every character in the movie. I'll start off by saying real quick that I have never seen an episode of "Twin Peaks". I'm not really familar with the subject matter, but I did know the basis.
Girl is dead, no one knows who killed girl. Plus, I'm a David Lynch fan so I had to see the film. I've seen 3 other David Lynch films: "Mulholland Dr." "Blue Velvet," "The Elephant Man"
Well this is certainly not his best film, but it's not his worse either. The movie starts off with a young girl, Teresa Banks, being found dead floating in the river. An investigation begins and after about 30 minutes, we change gears. Now we meet Laura Palmer. Shes in High School and is the prom queen I think, and she is pretty popular. However she lives with an abusive dad (Ray Wise) and a mom who doesn't know how to handle it. This basically sets up what is about to come. This is a very mystifying film. Even when you have no idea whatsoever about what is going on, your eyes are almost glued to the screen.But
I would highly suggest seeing the series first. Cause now that I have seen the movie, when I see the series, the surprise element is going to be gone a little bit. But yeah, Twin Peaks, is a must for Lynch fans. I gave the movie 4 stars partly cause I kind of knew who the killer was in the beginning and it might also have to do with the fact that i'm not familar with the series and everything. But anyway, B.

Rating:
Summary: The most undescribable, astonishing film I've ever seen
Review: I had heard much about the cult television series "Twin Peaks", and decided to buy the First Season on DVD. When I found that none of the stores near me had it in stock, I decided to pick up the movie instead. In some ways, this was good. In some, it was bad. Let me explain ...

In 1991, "Twin Peaks" was canceled. Immediately popular director David Lynch, who also created and wrote most of the show, said that he wasn't finished with the show yet ... and set to work making a movie that would close off the "Twin Peaks" phenomenon. "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me" - this film - is the result, a 135 minute journey into a realm where insanity and madness reign supreme.

"Fire Walk With Me" is a prequel to "Twin Peaks". The first thirty minutes deal with two FBI agents, Chester Desmond (Chris Isaak) and Sam Stanley (Kiefer Sutherland), who are investigating the murder of a young girl in the small town of Twin Peaks. Just when Desmond seems to have a suspect, we fade out and find that we are months later. From there, the film follows the events leading up to the mysterious death of Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee), which the series focused on. Kyle MacLachlan has some screentime as the series' main character, Dale Cooper.

This is probably the hardest film to review in the world. First of all, let me say that if you aren't a fan of "Twin Peaks" or of David Lynch, you will be lost shortly after the film begins. This movie was created solely for "Twin Peaks" lovers, and if you haven't seen the show, the mystery of who killed Laura Palmer is unveiled in this movie.

If ever there has been a movie that is pure insanity, it is this. "Fire Walk With Me" is one-hundred percent madness. And yet, throughout the whole film, I was completely mesmerized. And when the movie ended, I couldn't speak or do anything for about an hour. This movie truly has an effect on you, whether you're a fan of the show or not.

The cast is terrific, but it's David Lynch and Angelo Baladamenti who steal the show. Lynch is either a madman or a genius - I can't decide between the two. But Baladamenti is certainly a master composer, because his score for this film is beautiful.

Seeing is believing. That fits perfectly from this film. Perhaps after I watch the show, I will better understand this film. Until then, I can just say that it the most undescribable, frightening, mesmerizing, and astonishing film I've ever seen.


Rating:
Summary: For Fans of Hardcore Lynch, not necessarily fans of "Peaks"
Review: I don't like it... but who the hell am I?

David Lynch put fans of the TV show on notice when he opened Fire Walk With Me with a shot of TV set being smashed with an axe. As a fanatical Twin Peaks devotee, I remember remarking to a friend that "it should have been called 'Fire Suck With Me'".

In retrospect, that may have been a little harsh. What made Twin Peaks so absorbing for me was, in large measure, what makes any soap opera so addictive to its fans... story! Twin Peaks took a big complicated story and let it unfold in a stylish and leisurely way. You got to savor the mystery. I loved the way that the element of the supernatural wasn't even introduced until the third episode, and that was in the most low-key way imaginable, with Agent Cooper explaining his dream about Tibet.

Where I am coming from is: I consider myself a fan of Lynch's more traditional narrative work. Loved "Blue Velvet". Loved "Wild At Heart". Hated "Eraserhead".

In retrospect, I admire Lynch for making a film that was not a repackaging of old concepts, that would split the Peakies right down the middle. But I don't like it.

Not everything that I don't like about FWWM is Lynch's fault. After all, it wasn't Lynch's fault that, by the time the film was made, many of the cast looked kind of silly as high school students, their undeniable status as adults all the more obvious on the big screen.

On it's own, "Fire Walk With Me" is pretty interesting, but for a certain kind of fan, it's more of a footnote than a continuation of the classic TV series.

Here's a tip: I got my DVD copy in the bargain bin at Wal-Mart for $5.50. You may want to check your local WalMart before spending more.


Rating:
Summary: The most frightening and exhilarating movie I have ever seen
Review: I was a Twin Peaks fan, too, but this movie I love.

It may have been an accident: I sometimes wonder how attached to the thing Lynch was, the concept not being his alone but something he shared with Mark Frost. But forced to apply his specific way of seeing things to a pre-existing framework, he created a prequel to the series that was everything the series could not be, and in the process gave us some kind of masterpiece. Maybe it isn't as purely Lynch as Eraserhead or Blue Velvet, and perhaps it isn't as comfortable as Twin Peaks, but it is BETTER than any of them, perhaps because Lynch was forced to find an uneasy balance between that snakepit in his head and the demands of commercial cinema. Straining against the bonds of expectation (and breaking most of them) was good for him, and whether he felt any intimate attachment to the project or not, it seems to me to be the most successful presentation of his inner world.

Fire Walk With Me managed to chill me to the bone more than once in its running time, and I thought I was beyond being frightened by film forever. It also makes me cry every time I see it. The film is also literally thrilling, presenting a frightening and malign universe in which the damaged, angelic (and doomed) agents of a surreal FBI simply prove too delicate to survive with souls intact in the face of the kind of evil that would drive a father to rape his own daughter. You hear the word 'nightmarish' bandied about a lot in regard to horror films, and while I don't think I've ever heard this nightmarish thing referred to as a horror movie, that is just what it is: absolutely the finest horror film ever made. In the world of Fire Walk With Me it is the spiritual natures of the characters themselves that are in jeaopardy, and it is the stakes being so high that lends the story its depth and great power. This is going to sound like a ridiculous claim, but the closest approximation I know in literature is Dostoevsky. Remember the hair raising scene in Brother's Karamazov when the crippled girl who loves Alyosha purposely slams her finger in the door, and the look on her face? Or the scene in the Possessed in which the nihilist has agreed to commit suicide in order to prove that he is free, but is found in his pitch black room apparently trying to disappear into the wall? If those images stay with you, you're wired right to find a new favourite in Fire Walk With Me.

Twin Peaks was good in many ways, but it was also flabby -- most of the supporting characters could profitably have been dispensed with, particularly in the second season (and in Fire Walk With Me they are) -- and if we don't get as much of Dale Cooper as we might have liked in Fire, we should be glad that we at least get Lynch's final, purest meditation on what the series was all about. Strange as it may seem, this bizarre film about the darkest things is also one of the most paradoxically life affirming things I know of. Not only does it make me feel better about the movies and their potential, it makes me feel better about people.

Rating:
Summary: Sleep walk with me.
Review: I saw this movie when it first came out and didn't much care for that first impression. The special editon DVD didn't do anything to change that. As a director, David Lynch seems to take a weird delight in snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

Like some of his other work, e.g., the Twin Peaks series, Wild at Heart, and even to a degree, Blue Velvet. Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me begins very well--but changes speed and course somewhere in the middle act. Many seem to feel this directorial quirk of Lynch is an artistic statement, (and certainly that argument can be made) but it can also be seen as an incapacity for sustained concentration, or for handling big jobs. A view to which I now subscribe.

When Lynch is on, he is a refreshingly eccentric director. And he seems to have an unusual ability to inspire his actors. Remember those first episodes of the Twin Peaks series? FWWM certainly has its wonderfully idiosyncratic moments. The woman in the red dress and the boogyin' dwarf are memorable. But many scenes are strung together haphazardly. Build ups lead nowhere; and characters come and go for no apparent reason. The ending is lamentably weak and obscure. One wonders if even Lynch understands it.

As much as I enjoyed the first three quarters of the first season of the series. And as much as I enjoyed the first act of this movie, I was disappointed in the end.

Rating:
Summary: I can't say enough good things about this film . . .
Review: Let me start off by saying that I never watched the series because I was very young at the time. But I saw the movie a couple of years ago and I saw it again recently and it's now on my top ten list. To the people who say that you have to have watched the series to grasp the movie and to get into it, I tend to disagree. Although I did not understand everthing that went on, that is what I think kept me interested in it in the first place and makes me want to see it again and again. I saw "Mulholland Drive" as well a while back and I also thought it was a good movie though I prefer "Twin Peaks." Sheryl Lee is amazing and intense. I fell in love with her character and her tortured soul. I'd love to find out what other films she's done that other people would recommend seeing. With this movie, I walked away feeling that it's one of the most beautiful films I've ever seen and also the most cruel and anguished. When a director can make audiences feel such a wide range of emotions after seeing his films, that is a sign of a great director to me. As you can see by now, I would highly recommend everyone see this film as long as they have an open mind and don't expect to be spoon fed all the meanings and details of a movie.