flickering Lights, film is dead, David Lynch & Sundance here i come

"At the end of the novel, "Pyschical Detective" Lew Basnight complains about the movies turning "wild ancient days into harmless flickering entertainment." - Tom LeClair (1)

"Sitting in front of a fire is mesmerizing. It's magical. I feel the same way about electricity. And smoke. And flickering lights." - David Lynch (2)

I used to go weak-kneed when someone quoted the Upanishads. To quote the sweetest scripture is like quoting a tempting menu: "That which is unbounded is happy." Great, I'll have one to go please.

I'm only satiated by eating these days.

So it's wonderful to see David Lynch quoting the Upanishads liberally in Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness, and Creativity. I'd been thinking about video and thinking about Lynch lately as I tend to surrealism and magic realism myself, so I did a double-take when I spotted his book in the Mountain View bookstore window.

I reckon Lynch eats it up too: "The thing about meditation is: You become more and more you."

(And maybe my fav quote from the book:) "We're like lightbulbs. If bliss starts growing inside you, it's like a light; it affects the environment... and if you ramp it up brighter and brighter, you enjoy more and more of it. And that light will extend out further and further." - David Lynch (2)

"I'm through with film as a medium. For me, film is dead. If you look at what people all over the world are taking still pictures with now, you begin to see what's going to happen...

Working on INLAND EMPIRE was very different. We shot it entirely in digital video, so the level of flexibility and control was amazing.

Also, I didn't have a script. I wrote the thing scene by scene, without much of a clue where it would end. It was a risk, but I had this feeling that because all things are unified, this idea over here would somehow relate to that idea over there." - David Lynch (2)

"This reversion, if you will, to a cruder visual medium (but one that's in many ways more fluid, both for the actors – who can work through without pauses – and the editor – who has handy software – and the crew – who can be fewer, and work lighter), has stirred up the director's creative juices, brought him back in a way to the raw energies and immediacy of Eraserhead. Thus it's a return to youthful beginnings and yet something completely new. It's burning the bridges and rediscovering roots at the same time, which basically is what any artist to stay alive needs to do... After fifteen years of disappointment with and doubt about DL, it is possible to love his work again." - IMDb user Chris Knipp reviewing Inland Empire

So yeah, probably not a journal but a DV camera I'm taking to Nola end of February Mardi Gras 2007. We'll see where weaving New Orleans post-Katrina (water), 9/11 (fire), and 1906 SF earthquake (earth), and perhaps an air element? -- and the Book of Revelations, jazz and prophecy, Kerouac and Charlie Parker, unfold as it unfolds.

p.s. I'll be at Sundance Film Festival this Saturday, Sunday, Monday. Call, or text me if you'd like to meet up 408 513 7324.

p.p.s. Lynch's Inland Empire will be playing Feb 8th, 7 p.m. at the Castro Theater during SF IndieFest. From the IndieFest program: "The movie tells the story of an actress, Nikki Grace (the extraordinary Laura Dern), who is signed in to star in a movie that her neighbor (in a gloriously bizarre turn by Grace Zabriskie) warns her is based on a gypsy curse. The story unfolds like a Chinese box: a film within a film that flows back and forth from Hollywood to Poland and from real to surreal. And then there are the giant talking rabbits. Lynch's cinema works at a level below rational inquiry. [Or outside of it.] It's the stuff that dreams are made of."
 

(1) Tom LeClair, "Lead Zeppelin: Encounters with the unseen in Pynchon's new novel", Bookforum, Dec 2006/Jan 2007

(2) David Lynch, Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness, and Creativity

images Grace Hartigan's ('A work of art is the trace of a magnificent struggle. All time is comprehended.") Hunting the Boar; and bison cave art from Altamira Cave circa 15,000-12,000 BC

Comments

[reza]

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[Amine]

Hi Evelyn,

David Lynch is hosting a special weekend in May, which your readers might be interested in.

If you'd like to have a graphic for your site, it's available at http://lynchweekend.org/media

We suggest that the graphic contain a link to http://lynchweekend.org

Thank you and all the best.

Amine Kouider
Student event coordintor

[Steven Harold - London Hypnosis]

Just wanted to pick up on your comment about meditation and it helping you become more you. In my opinion this is what is needed for true happiness... accepting yourself.

[Maya]

Hi Evelyn,

My do list: get a copy of the book “Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness and Creativity”.

I loved this quote; “The thing about meditation is: You become more and more you."

Like you, I think that the Upanishads gave us the answer to our deepest questions. Unfortunately, most of the world is not aware of its true significance even after 5000 years.

The Taittiriya Upanishad teaches us that the body is the first of several layers that make up the human personality. Each of these layers needs to be removed before “you” realize that “you” are not the physical body, “your” emotions, “your” will or “your” mind..

So what then is the real “YOU”? What remains when every trace of individuality is removed? Pure, divine, spiritual being! But we don’t have to take another’s word for it, says the Upanishads.

Tat Tvam Asi - You are (already) THAT

“THAT” is the mystery each one of us can find out through Nididhyasana or Meditation. Although there are several forms of meditation taught by excellent teachers, we all have to find the perfect one that will lead us into awareness.

One site that gives us some guidelines on how to find the perfect meditation instruction is http://www.meditationhome.com

It may take a while to learn the real YOU, but the Upanishads say that there is no other answer that is worth knowing !!

I have found my teacher and am in the process of knowing the real ME J too.

Wishing you all the best!

Maya

[Yuliy]

Today it seems very interesting, very universal. Can clear case bicker about this, but did not say I'm thrilled now

[Клининг]

We're like lightbulbs. If bliss starts growing inside you, it's like a light; it affects the environment.

[Happy]

It's burning the bridges and rediscovering roots at the same time, which basically is what any artist to stay alive needs to do...

[cheap ray ban sunglasses]

flickering Lights, film is dead, David Lynch & Sundance here i come - Crossroads Dispatches