Tag: kyle maclachlan

PTS Presents the Raymond Benson Auteur Series: DAVID LYNCH Volume 1

by Frank Mengarelli, posted in Film Review, Podcast

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Podcasting Them Softly is incredibly excited to continue our Raymond Benson Auteur Series with our first of a two part chat about the works of David Lynch. Frank, Tim, and Raymond discuss Lynch’s early works continued through his features ERASERHEAD, THE ELEPHANT MAN, DUNE, BLUE VELVET, and the first two seasons of TWIN PEAKS. The three of them will be back soon covering Lynch’s filmography from WILD AT HEART to TWIN PEAKS: THE RETURN. For those local listeners, please check Raymond’s website for upcoming book signing appearances for Raymond’s new novel, THE SECRETS OF CHICORY LANE.

B Movie Glory: Xchange 

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review


Imagine Face/Off, but cheaper and the ‘face off’ concept replaced by actual body/soul teleportation and you have Xchange, a fairly decent, pretty silly little low grade, high concept SciFi piece with some decent actors (barring Stephen Baldwin, that hamface) and a story that makes you think, albeit not too strenuously. Somewhere in the nearish future, a company called Xchange has patented a weird body mind swapping doohickey that allows instantaneous teleportation via swapping my out with another person’s body over at your destination. Of course a method like this attracts trouble, in the form of terrorist Kyle MacLachlan, who wants to do all sorts of mean things with the technology. A counter agent (Kim Coates) hunts him down, and a random blue collar worker (Baldwin) unwittingly gets caught up in the espionage, finds himself trapped in a clone’s body whilst the terrorist and agent switch places, and… yeah. Something like that. I’m sure the movie makes more sense than this review, but I may have been under the influence of certain things when I watched it. MacLachlan and Coates are a funny pairing, as one is obviously suited as the villain (Kim), while the other always seems to play upright types (shades of Agent Cooper here). Kyle gets to be mean for about five minutes right in the opening, before the ol’ switcharoo goes down and then Kim flexes his all too familiar, and always entertaining villain muscles, which seems to be a calculated casting choice by the powers that be. I remember this being not half bad, but any film with Baldwin (exception for The Usual Suspects) just sinks a bit simply by having him around to stink it up with his presence, although the other two do just fine with their roles. Definite late night cable background noise when everyone else is passed out. 

-Nate Hill

PTS Presents IT DOESN’T GET ANY BLUER Episode 1

by Frank Mengarelli, posted in Film Review, Podcast

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We’re back to discuss the finale of TWIN PEAKS: THE RETURN. We’ve rebranded slightly, Tim and Frank are officially joined by Mya McBriar to assemble Podcasting Them Softly’s It Doesn’t Get Any Bluer Twin Peaks podcast! Today we’ll be discussing the last two episodes of the latest season, discuss what we all think it meant, how we felt about it, and will there be any more TWIN PEAKS?

TWIN PEAKS: THE RETURN

by Frank Mengarelli, posted in Film Review

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Let’s discuss Showtime’s finest “original” programming and David Lynch and Mark Frost’s cataclysmic finale of the TWIN PEAKS saga. First things first, will we get another season or a standalone film that is akin to FIRE WALK WITH ME? Probably not, no. Sure, stranger things have happened, but it’s more than likely we will not get another visual TWIN PEAKS story, and may not even get another film from Lynch himself. This very well could be it for both Peaks and Lynch.

What does the final season mean? What does it answer in the twenty-five-year absence? What happened to Cooper at the end? Honestly, none of that really matters, does it? The more diehard fans of both Lynch and his seminal series with Mark Frost, are not looking for answers, one could say that they are just seeking more unfulfilled questions that will keep them returning to the Peaks canon over a series of years, if not decades.

One thing is apparently clear from THE RETURN. Lynch’s obsession with dreams and a parallel reality which is all rolled into lifelong inspiration, THE WIZARD OF OZ. OZ deals very much in dreams, a parallel reality, and one’s journey back home or at the very least the center of their own reality. There are a plethora of motifs and nods to the film within the series.

THE RETURN isn’t very much like the original series, aside from a string of arcs from beloved characters. What truly perpetuates the main narrative is FIRE WALK WITH ME, which is even more of an important component of the mythology of TWIN PEAKS than ever.

David Bowie’s brief cameo as time traveling Blue Rose Task Force Special Agent Phillip Jeffries became the great and powerful Oz of THE RETURN. He spoke in a method of half riddles, through puffs of steam coming from a percolator.  Sadly, David Bowie was not able to start and complete his scheduled scenes, so instead actor Nathan Frizzell was cast as the voice of Jeffries, and even overdubbed Jeffries’ dialogue from FIRE WALK WITH ME and THE MISSING PIECES. Regardless of the lack of David Bowie, Lynch was able to bring him back into the spotlight, not only in the foreground of the new series but also as the pop culture icon that he had always been.

 

Without diving into the Lynchian mathematics that is near impossible to solve within THE RETURN, the series ends itself exactly where it began. Cooper is in the Lodge, speaking with Mike and with Laura Palmer whispering in his ear. What does that all mean? It means that Cooper is looped inside of his own dream, within the Black Lodge, and with this reveal, it certainly calls the entire run of this season into question, and makes us ask ourselves what is the reality of the show? Is the reality we saw outside the Black Lodge a tangible reality, a parallel reality, or is it fictitious and all conjured up within Dale Cooper’s head as his sits in the Black Lodge?

David Lynch and Mark Frost brought the season back to where it began and left the audience with a bigger question than what was originally asked. They not only created the finest television event of the year but possibly ever. They have crafted an alluring, taut, and downright haunting story that has no end.

 

David Lynch’s BLUE VELVET

by Frank Mengarelli, posted in Film Review

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BLUE VELVET may just be one of the most depraved and transgressive love stories ever put on film. It’s a complex narrative that ushers the audience past their comfort zone into a dark and dangerous world of obsession and perversion. Not only do we enter this world through our innocent protagonist, Jeffery Beaumont, but we see and experience what he is exposed to. As his innocence erodes, as does ours.

Like anything David Lynch, the film is richly layered. The color scheme can be overanalyzed, as can the vague shadow world crime story, and especially the shifting timeline. When we’re in Jeffery’s world, we are in this overly nostalgic “good old days” of Americana and once we enter into Frank Boothe’s life in the fast lane all of a sudden we are thrown into this overly stinging and lightspeed paced contemporary (the 1980s) world of drugs, violence, and sexual perversion.

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Lynch constructs a deeply layered world by his own aesthetic and his brilliant casting strokes. Kyle MacLachlan and Laura Dern’s star-making performances zigzag back and forth between the two worlds that Lynch creates, showcasing their brilliant range as actors as they carefully hold the audience’s hands during the build up of the story only to rip away once they enter the world of Frank Boothe.

Dennis Hopper is incredible in this film. His embodiment of Frank Boothe is not only one of the finest performances on film ever, but it is such a bold and daring performance. Frank Boothe is nearly irredeemable. He’s disgusting, he’s dangerous, he’s insane – yet he has a very empathetical trait. Everything he is doing, he’s doing because he is so very much in love with Dorothy Vallens played by Isabella Rossellini who matches and outdoes Hopper when it comes to giving a deeply brave performance.

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With Lynch’s casting of Priscilla Pointer, Frances Bay, and George Dickerson he builds his pure vision of the idea of America, only to tear it down with the Hopper and more specifically former Golden Age of Hollywood child star Dean Stockwell in one of the most unique and scene-stealing performances ever. Stockwell’s overly caked on makeup, 70’s powder suit, and lip syncing Roy Orbison’s IN DREAMS using a work light as a microphone is one of the most memorably haunting scenes in Lynch’s canon, and that’s saying a lot.

Once the rip cord is pulled in the film, it is an incredibly exhilarating ride. How this film got made, or better yet distributed to the degree it did upon its initial release is gobsmacking. It’s a piece of cinema that will never be outdone. It propelled Lynch into a stratosphere of auteurs that not many can even approach.

ACTOR’S SPOTLIGHT with JAMES MORRISON

by Frank Mengarelli, posted in Film Review, Podcast

Today we have an incredibly special episode for you guys. Joining Frank, Tim, and Nate is veteran actor, playwright, and musician James Morrison. James has graced the stage and screen for decades, appearing in SPACE ABOVE AND BEYOND, MILLENNIUM, THE X-FILES, THE WEST WING, four seasons of 24, PRIVATE PRACTICE and recently appeared on the third season of TWIN PEAKS as Warden Murphy. James also appeared in Steven Spielberg’s CATCH ME IF YOU CAN and Sam Mendes’ vastly underrated JARHEAD. He has also released two albums, I BROKE FREE and SON TO THE BOY. To sample or purchase James’ music and his plays, and for everything else James Morrison, please visit his website JPMORRISON.com.

Twin Peaks: on the eve of revival – a rambling write-up by Nate Hill

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review


When I first discovered David Lynch’s Twin Peaks some ten years ago, I was hooked from that first lilting chord of the opening theme, a Pacific Northwest lullaby that dreamily pulled back a red curtain to reveal the mesmerizing realm of sawmills, Douglas firs, cherry pie, secrets, metaphysics, owls, murder mysteries, eccentricities, FBI Agents, roadside diners and so much more. There was nothing quite like it under the sun. Lynch had tapped into the intangible flavour in the ice cream parlour, an undefinable conduit to the subconscious, an emotional fever dream of haunting music, beautiful storytelling and vivid, compelling character arcs, and I knew from that moment on I’d be living in this world, in whatever capacity, for the rest of my life. Since then I’ve seen the entire run of seasons one and two at least thirty to forty times, and watched Fire Walk With Me, Lynch’s big screen masterpiece and companion song to the show, even more. Twin Peaks is the one thing I can revisit at any crux of the story, during any phase of my life, and it will always draw me right back in like the beckoning grove of sycamore trees who stand as sentinels to the great beyond lying just around the bend in the woods. There was just one problem with it all: the show was tragically cancelled on the penultimate beat, a cosmic cliffhanger that left fans reeling and plunged the legacy into exile for decades, a vacuum left in air that once housed a worldwide phenomenon, which is the only way to describe what season one did not just for television, but for the arts themselves, a thunderous ripple effect that has inspired generations of fan culture and adoration. To quote another film that finds its home in the trees, “If you ride like lightening, you’re going to crash like thunder”, which in a way is what happened to Twin Peaks. That lightening was captured in a bottle, which unfortunately shattered to shards via a combination of network interference and creative differences. Needless to say, the thought of a possible return to the show was beyond low on my list of things that could happen, right down there next to dinosaur cloning. Life finds a way though, and so apparently does Lynch. When it was announced that he had struck a deal with Showtime for an epic eighteen episode return to those Douglas firs, the internet nearly imploded upon itself. The golden age of television had just gone platinum, for Twin Peaks is the cornerstone of a generation of storytelling, a mile marker of stylistic structure and expression that gave life to countless other legacies in its wake. If any fragmented, incomplete tale deserves another day in court, it’s Peaks. For a while we sat on our hands and held our breath, the words ‘too good to be true’ ringing around in our heads. After a few hitches in the giddyup, however, and some three years of development later, we have arrived on the day that the new season premieres, and it still hasn’t set in for me. Eighteen brand new episodes. All written and directed by the man himself. A titanic sized cast of Twin Peaks residents both old and new, from every walk of Hollywood, genre town, music world and indie-ville. It definitely does seem to good to be true, and yet here we are, on the eve of a television paradigm shift. Any new fans who have hurriedly made their way through the original series run for the first time should pause for a moment and realize just how infinitely lucky we are to get this, how special this truly is, and will be for the entire summer. I feel as though this will be the second wave of Lynch’s magnum opus, a stroke of creative brilliance that has come full circle, and in just a few hours time those beloved chords will once again flow out from our television screens, as the journey continues onward to a destination whose coordinates Lynch guards like Pandora’s Box. Come what may, I will be tuned in to whatever the man and his team of actors, artists and musicians have in store for us. See you in the trees.

-Nate Hill

The Hidden

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review


The Hidden is the kind of flick that makes you sit back, sink a little deeper into the couch, take a long swig of lager and nostalgically murmur “they don’t make ’em like they used to.” Maybe I was just born in the wrong era, but the 80’s and 90’s just seemed to hurl forth so many winners, unbridled genre bliss that only got better with age, worth the revisit every time. The effects were practical, the stories were told with love, care and inspiration and the action was real, hard hitting and built to last. This film one opens with what can literally only be described as a cinematic version of Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto; we see a well dressed, determined man (Twin Peak’s Chris Mulkey in batshit mode) rob a bank, obliterate several police officers with a big honkin’ shotgun, steal a Ferrari, drive said Ferrari through a busy park, smoke a dude in a wheelchair at over a hundred clicks, lead the entire police force on an apocalyptic highway chase and cheerfully get ventilated in a hailstorm of bullets upon careening through their barricade. Case closed, right? Not for a mysterious FBI Agent (Kyle MacLachlan) who arrives out of nowhere and commandeers the case from the leading detectives (Ed O Ross and a wicked sharp Michael Nouri). MacLachlan knows something the force doesn’t, let alone would ever believe: there’s an alien running around inhabiting human bodies a là Body Snatchers, and going on hedonistic tirades of the worst possible behaviour, hence the shotgun tantrum in the opener. How does he know this, you ask? Because he himself is an alien in a Kyle suit, intrepidly pursuing the other one from a distant galaxy to halt it’s destructive shenanigans forever. It’s a premise that could have opened the door to all sorts of ooey gooey creature effects, but the film minimizes on those, choosing a few key moments to show the slime, and focuses mainly on glass shattering, guns blazing action, a neat recipe of three parts action with a tablespoon of yuck, if you will. MacLachlan, still very young at the time, anchors his performance with emotional heft, amusing aloofness and the necessary grit that can be found in his iconic portrayal of Agent Dale Cooper on Twin Peaks, and I was reminded more than a few times of that character while watching him in this. As the extraterrestrial nutjob moves from host to host, blowing everything up and leaving a trail of massacred people in it’s wake, the two of them race at every turn to catch up, and it’s Nouri who finds the seething anger one must get watching an outsider roll up and stamp all over someone else’s territory. The alien isn’t interested in world domination, resources or assimilation, it just wants to fuck shit up and have a good time, man. Blasting rock n’ roll music, gorging itself on steak dinners, stealing every Ferrari it can get it’s hands on and raiding the police evidence room for all kinds of heavy artillery, this thing doesn’t slow down for a second. This is the only film I know that paints off-earth visitors quite like this, just a gleeful, anarchic adrenaline junkie asshole, and I admire the brutal honesty, because I know of quite a few morons who would probably engage in the exact same behaviour, should they ever find themselves incognito and without consequences on an unassuming, far away planet. This one is pure screaming fun the whole way through, and should be every bit as iconic as other sci fi tales that are remembered more prolifically. Watch for the tiniest Danny Trejo cameo, playing (guess what) a prison inmate.  

-Nate Hill

David Lynch’s Twin Peaks Fire Walk With Me: A Review by Nate Hill

by natewatchescoolmovies, posted in Film Review

  
David Lynch’s big screen prequel/sequel to his television phenomenon Twin Peaks departs from the shows light, kooky and benignly eccentric sensibilities. It starts at the more surreal, dark atmosphere which sometimes materialized in the show, especially in the last episode, and plunges headlong down a rabbit hole of sex, murder, mysteries, federal agents, parallel universes, psychological torment, otherworldly spirits, supernatural phenomena, incest, more cups of coffee (Im not even kidding, there’s a scene where a stressed out looking Harry Dean Stanton makes a ‘cup of good morning America’), and above all, Laura Palmer. The beautiful, mysterious homecoming queen we only saw as a corpse in the series comes to wild, screaming life in this film, and what a performance from the gifted Sheryl Lee. She perfectly captures the menace, hurt, confusion, hope, torment and wild desperation of Laura, in a towering, stunning performance. Ray Wise is equally magnificent as Leland Palmer. Angelo Badalamenti switches up the tone as well, letting the beautiful Laura theme and the classic Twin Peaks tones only play in limited, selective fashion. His theme for the film is a powerfully dark, otherworldly melody which lulls you right into the film’s deep velvet grasp and haunts you in ways you can’t describe. The angel of the Roadhouse, Julee Cruise, gets another tune to croon as well, and it might just be my favourite of the bunch. Laura tearfully looks on as Cruise intones ‘Questions In A World Of Blue’, a transfixing lament that seems to be meant for her alone. Lynch is a true master of the subtle touch, and you’d have to read many an online forum as well as watch the film and the show several times to pick up on all the hidden implications and shrouded ideas that aren’t readily presented to you in a traditional narrative. That inaccessibility and refusal to play by the rules by serving things straight up is difficult for many people to get their heads around. To me though it’s such a fascinating way to tell a story. He doesn’t necessarily leave everything open to interpretation, he just hides the answers in a bewitching blanket of surreality, subtlety and dream logic, challenging the viewer to think using the unconscious mind and intuition to feel your way through the story, as opposed to tallying up facts and plot turns to analytically arrive at your cinematic destination. Perhaps this is why he meticulously oversees many of the DVD releases for his films, leaving out scene selections and unnecessary bells and whistles. The story matters most to him, in singular, unbroken form, a segment of his soul encapsulated on film in one cohesive effort, like a dream caught unawares by the lens. Fire Walk With Me was unfairly bashed, booed and downright critically clobbered for its stark and outright changes from the shows lighter tones, as well as its leaving out of some of the more popular characters that fans loved. Although this is jarring, I feel like Lynch has distilled all the elements in the show that mattered the most to him, and woven a gorgeous, seductive tapestry of pure Twin Peaks ‘feel’ and spectacle, as a loving gift to the fans who truly get it and are open to the wilder ideas explored briefly in the show. The film expands greatly on the ominous Black Lodge, and it’s dwelling spirits, including the strange Tremonds, the one armed Mike, and the little red suited Man From Another Place. The killer demon Bob is very prevalent in this film, and if you thought he was scary in the show, well.. His scenes in this are downright soul shatteringly. Moira Kelly makes a softer, doe eyed version of Donna Hayward, which I quite liked. Miguel Ferrer returns as the cynical wise-ass Albert, Lynch as the hard of hearing FBI boss Gordon Cole, as well as Heather Graham, Grace Zabriskie, Eric DaRe, Madchen Amick, Peggy Lipton, etc. Newcomers to the Twin Peaks mythology are great as well, including Chris Isaak and Kiefer Sutherland as more FBI agents investigating the case of Teresa Banks in Deer Meadow, Jurgen Prochnow as a trapped soul in the spirit world, and a confused looking David Bowie as an agent who has been mired in the time bending fog of the spirit world long enough to render him brain fried. It’s a love letter to the fans, really, but one that doesn’t compromise an inch and is every ounce a Lynch picture, capturing the director at his most creative adventurous. He strives to plumb the depths of human behaviour and the forces beyond our perceptions which govern and influence from other planes. Seeing these tricky themes explored so rawly in a film based upon a TV show that had heavy roots soap opera and an often lighthearted tone only garnished with the disturbing elements in the film can be hard to swallow, which is no doubt the reason for the sour reception upon release. The film has stood the test of time and aged wonderfully though, seen by many grateful, loving fans as a dark dream straight from the heart, and a perfect film. If one is willing to accept the changes in tone and ambiguous, challenging nature of Lynch’s storytelling (which I love!) then Fire Walk With Me is a sumptuous, gorgeous looking, vital piece of the Twin Peaks world, and in my mind Lynch’s masterpiece.