The Charge
"You want to hear about
our specials? We don't have any." -- Irene (Sandra Kindler)
Opening Statement
She's dead, wrapped in plastic. Her name is Teresa Banks.
FBI boss Gordon Cole (David Lynch), trusting intuition and
cryptic clues (the FBI seems more like a Rosicrucian order
than a policing agency), sends two low-key agents, Chet
Desmond (Chris Isaak) and Sam Stanley (Kiefer Sutherland) to
Deer Meadow to investigate. They get surly service at Hap's
Diner, scuffle with the sneering Sheriff Cable and his
deputies, and search the trailer park where Teresa lived. In
the course of the investigation, Agent Desmond
vanishes.
One year later, in the sleepy town of Twin
Peaks, Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee) whispers to her hapless
boyfriend James Hurley (James Marshall), "I'm gone." And soon
she will be.
The Evidence
What does it mean to burn? Sound burns: each time you
speak, waves move outward. Their friction heats the objects
around you. The hiss of static is like the hiss of fire,
consuming noise. In the end, all that remains are ashes,
cinders.
The repercussions of a death cause waves to
spread outward as well. We all know by now what changes were
wrought by the death of Laura Palmer. Twin Peaks: Fire Walk
With Me brings Laura's journey full circle, wrapping up
the final moments of the television series (a brief appearance
by Heather Graham as Annie, in Laura's dream, reveals what we
all know from the series cliffhanger, that "the good Dale" is
trapped in the Lodge, where time does not matter, and awaits
Laura's arrival) and offering new secrets (who is Judy?) that
may lead us on new paths.
In spite of the Teresa Banks
prologue, the real core of Fire Walk With Me is Laura
Palmer. We follow the last week of her life, knowing what will
happen to her, and knowing that beneath the cool exterior of
the homecoming queen is a drug-addicted, promiscuous
manipulator so deep in trouble that her actual death might
have almost been an afterthought. And yet, David Lynch chooses
to dwell here on a third side to Laura Palmer, one little
explored (though hinted at during the second season) during
the television series: Laura Palmer as abuse victim. In this
light, her kindly daytime façade and self-destructive
nighttime persona begin to make tragic sense. Laura throws
herself into debauchery as an escape, as a way of creating
some perverse justification for the trauma she suffers at the
hands of her own father. Leland (Ray Wise) Palmer's torment by
an "inner demon" suddenly makes sense as well: BOB is the dark
heart of man made flesh. Does Leland embrace BOB willingly, or
is he merely a pawn of a greater evil?
And Donna,
Laura's best friend? Here Lynch takes advantage of Lara Flynn
Boyle's absence to cast Moira Kelly -- a doppelganger Donna in
a film rife with doubles. This Donna craves the identity of
her lovely and troubled friend, sneaking after Laura at night,
naively trying to mimic her depravity -- and Laura will have
none of it. Laura knows the path she is on will ultimately
kill her, one way or another. As she tells Harold (Lenny von
Dohlen), who keeps her diary safe from her tormentor BOB, "He
says he wants to be me, or he'll kill me." But after all,
doesn't Laura secretly want to be somebody else, in
order to escape the terrors of being Leland Palmer's
daughter?
Sheryl Lee, who was given little chance to
stretch during the series (even as Laura's doppelganger cousin
Madeline), shows a talent here for barely contained hysteria.
Ray Wise, suppressing fury, and Moira Kelly, offering a mix of
longing and concern, carry themselves well. The rest of the
cast, while not given much to do, seem comfortable in their
characters -- which is understandable considering they are
stepping directly over from the television screen. Well, at
least in the Twin Peaks portion of the film. During the Deer
Meadow investigation, we must endure the bland Desmond and
Stanley. Not to disparage Isaak and Sutherland's performances
(they are always good, and Lynch has always had a deft hand
with actors), but the characters seem deliberately flat and
the situation has a "let's get this over with and get to Laura
Palmer" feel to it.
The first act of the film feels
cramped, more of a parody of the original Laura Palmer
investigation than an individual story. Of course, it fits the
"doppelganger" theme perfectly, with Desmond and Stanley as
mirror images of Cooper and Albert Rosenfield (Desmond as cool
to Cooper's enthusiasm; Stanley as bland to Albert's fury) --
and everything from the bad coffee to the sinister sheriff as
reversals of Twin Peaks. But it seems more of a one-off joke
on the television series that does not provide us with much
new information or thematic development. Surprisingly, we can
glean much more useful information from the bizarre
manifestation of Philip Jeffries (David Bowie) at FBI
headquarters: themes of power (Jeffries shouts about
electricity, later Laura looks at power lines, and of course,
fire figures in here), surveillance (cameras, the use of
static to suggest the virtuality of their collective
dreamworld), disappearance. But the heart of Fire Walk With
Me is the final week of Laura Palmer's life.
If
anything, the film actually suffers from having to conform to
the restrictions of a "Twin Peaks movie." Left to itself, the
story of Laura Palmer's psychological journey holds up, but in
between, we are obligated to make sense of Bobby's bumbling
attempts to be a drug dealer and James' perennial pouting.
Perhaps this material would have worked better if Lynch had
severed it from the Peaks franchise entirely. Most of it would
still have worked (Cooper as an enigmatic policeman fated to
play Laura's spirit guide, the demons of the Lodge still
manipulating human behavior) anyway. Like the television show
at its best, we must treat the events in Fire Walk With
Me as if they are happening in a dream, where characters
and events mean several things at once, and the fantastic
overlaps with the realistic without question.
Legend
holds that Lynch shot a host of scenes featuring Twin
Peaks regulars, as a gift to the fans, that ended up on
the cutting room floor. Although, as I just noted, the film
overall probably would have been better off not being a
Twin Peaks project, it is unfortunately that
distribution rights for this additional material could not be
worked out for the DVD. The only extras are a theatrical
trailer (which plays up the child abuse angle prominently) and
a 30-minute collection of interviews with the cast, chopped
together to make it seem as if the cast is chatting with one
another about what they have been up to lately and how Twin
Peaks affected their careers. There are some funny stories
too, of course, and a bit about the missing scenes. The absent
Lynch comes across as an enigma (as he would likely want):
with some actors he allows improvisation, others must conform
to the letter of the script; with some he is forthcoming, with
others he is cryptic. Perspective here is as subjective as it
is in the series and film. But all agree that Lynch can handle
actors skillfully. As Michael Anderson puts it, "When you
start pulling your subject matter from your own unconscious,
it hits coincidental bells in other people's unconsciousness
that you don't know you're gonna hit."
Although the
film boasts an anamorphic transfer that looks quite acceptable
much of the time, the latter half of the film suffers from
color bleed and scanning lines (especially during the Red Room
scenes). And there was one major case of artifacting toward
the end. Perhaps I received a defective copy as a screener (I
have heard no one else complain about these problems), but if
this is not the case, these technical errors are inexcusable.
Of minor concern is Lynch's refusal to allow a chapter index
on the disc, but it certainly does not affect viewing the
film.
Closing Statement
David Lynch fans are probably going to find more to be
pleased with in Fire Walk With Me than those looking
for a comfortable followup to Twin Peaks, but even if
this is one of Lynch's weaker efforts due to the narrative
constraints he is obligated to follow. Perhaps all that extra
content, trapped in the Black Lodge of litigation, will see
the light of day in the future. And perhaps New Line has fixed
the egregious problems with the transfer by the time you read
this. Would you like a soothing bowl of garmonbozia in the
meantime?
The Verdict
Laura is forgiven. But those who feed on pain and
suffering are still at large. And some of them apparently work
at New Line. This court stands in recess, in search of a good
cup of coffee.
From DVD
Verdict
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