/lit/ - Literature

>>15396455
>I don't think he usually makes articulated, conscious attempts at simulating dreams
I respect that opinion but I completely disagree. Everything about how his movies are constructed is dreamlike. The lighting, the strange dialogue, the melodramatic characters, the privileging of the symbolic over the physical, it all screams dream structure. Mulholland Drive is literally an elongated dream sequence lol. My problem isn't the surreal nature of his works, its how he uses symbolism within the surreal worlds he creates. Heres an example:

The opening of Blue Velvet is a series of shots of a nice suburban neighborhood (representing the goodie-goodie, romanticized view of American life) which are cross cut with shots of festering insects (of course representing the dark underbelly that exists within the same society as the nice houses). While this opening does set up the theme of the movie, I can't help but think that it's just using cheap, contrived symbolism to represent something that could have had a more direct representation in the film. In fact this idea (the innocent juxtaposed with the abhorrent) does get direct representation in later scenes, many of the Dennis Hopper scenes accomplish this for example. Anything that can be directly represented should be. Symbolic language should be used only when its the only tool at your disposal to explore an idea. That's why dreams are surreal, they are exploring things we do not yet fully understand. But David Lynch does understand the ideas he's exploring, he just obfuscates them. Also, I really like Lynch's films and Twin Peaks is one of my favorite shows. I'm not trying to rip on him or say that he's a hack, I just sometimes roll my eyes at how blunt and self aware his films can be.

ITT we post our strangest dreams and psychoanalyze them