Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site linus.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!cv From: cv@linus.UUCP (Chris J. Valas) Newsgroups: net.movies Subject: Re: Eraserhead (Hellooo, spoiler.) Message-ID: <353@linus.UUCP> Date: Wed, 1-May-85 10:47:05 EDT Article-I.D.: linus.353 Posted: Wed May 1 10:47:05 1985 Date-Received: Thu, 2-May-85 06:26:35 EDT References: <1911@decwrl.UUCP> Reply-To: cv@linus.UUCP (Chris J. Valas) Organization: The MITRE Corporation, Bedford, MA Lines: 86 -=- In article <1911@decwrl.UUCP> dross@vlnvax.DEC writes: > Can anyone offer explanation as to the reasoning behind the making >of "Eraserhead"? I rented it this weekend and was unimpressed, disappointed, >and confused. Why would anyone PAY to have this movie made? It does not >entertain, inform, stimulate the brain, or evoke any emotion. "Eraserhead" is a meditation on various depressing aspects of marriage and children. Throughout the course of the movie, Henry is subjected to the absolute worst imaginable versions of the standard marriage/children scenes. To cite a few: - The first time Henry goes to his (God help us) "girlfriend's" house, he suffers through an argument at the door, is molested by the girl's *mother*, is informed that she is pregnant and they will have to marry. At the dinner table, Henry is asked to carve the squabs (ever get put on the spot as someone else's guest?), and, of course, everything goes wrong, even though Henry has *nothing* to do with it... The mother and daughter have a fight at the table, and they both run into the kitchen, amid much crying and dissension, leaving Henry to talk to the weird father, with whom he has nothing in common. The whole episode is one nightmare resolutely following another, until you can hardly stand to watch another moment! - After they have married, they move to Henry's tiny, ill-appointed apartment. They are in bed and the wife (remember she is pregnant) is having nightmares and abrupt writhings; Henry looks under the sheet and begins to pull on something. He jerks it sharply free and his wife convulses; it was obviously pulled from inside of her body... Henry lifts it up and realizes it resembles a huge misshapen sperm and throws it against the wall, repulsed. Even though he *is* repulsed, he continues to pull more of these hideous objects from within the wife. We realize that both of them are suffering from guilt and anxiety over the pregnancy, with Henry symbolically ridding her of his semen. (Forgive, folks, but an explanation was asked for...) - Henry is laying on the bed, and has a daydream, escaping his nagging wife by visualizing a girl on a stage, singing a happy song (Chorus: "In heaven, everything is fine..."). Symbolic sperm start to rain down from above the stage: This is Henry's reality injecting itself into his escapist vision. Henry manipulates the dream-image of the girl by having her start to stamp on the offending sperm, crushing them, and the intrusion, while still singing. There are too many of them though, and the dream-state collapses, leaving Henry back in his apartment. - Their child is born weak and hideously deformed. It cries with a mono- tonous regularity (as do most infants :-) ) but only the wife is able to calm it. It is interesting to note that the child has no name or gender in the movie. Without these things, we focus our attention on how it affects Henry's environment, rather than on the details of the child itself. Henry can hardly believe he has fathered such a creature, trying at first to suppress its' presence, and then trying to destroy it. At this point, the child (more symbolism) grows huge and begins to attack and lunge at Henry, now truly the monster its appearance threatened all along. By hurting the child, Henry has magnified his problems a hundredfold. Henry is rarely an agent of action in "Eraserhead". People and circumstance act on Henry throughout, illustrating the common feeling many people have of being manipulated when faced with the various prospects of marriage and becoming a parent. Societys' expectations and the desires of relatives and spouses are most often the sources of these feelings, and these points are aptly rendered in the movie. "Eraserhead" was directed by David Lynch, lately responsible for the DUNE fiasco (no flames please; DUNE stinks, but that's just *my* opinion). He does throw in a tremendous amount of oppressive detail, extending even to the industrial-noise soundtrack and the stark off-black-and-white tone of the photography. Henry's attention to the strange little details in this movie (intermittent sputtering light bulbs, piles of grass carefully arranged in his apartment, etc.) are designed to give us a context for his reactions of fascination and horror to the main events. I've seen the movie several times and found it hard to ignore all of the detail long enough to get the message. After the second time, I was used to all of the "bits of business" and could step back a little and try to figure out what Lynch was trying to do. I recommend it to fans of dark and oppressive lifestyles ;-). To Doug Ross: try it again. I really didn't care for it the first time either. Chris J. Valas {decvax,utzoo,philabs,security,allegra,genrad}!linus!cv -=-