Erase Your Head

Yesterday, my much-coveted DVD of Eraserhead 2000 arrived via UPS. Last night I sat in front of my computer and enjoyed it. Kind of like reliving the 70s, but better. For one thing, I didn't need to watch it at midnight at the pot-choked Strand Theater in OB.

The film stands the test of time. Of course it's crude effects-wise, although that worm baby crying in the night still manages to send chills up and down the spine. The movie is an effective nightmare--comical, disturbing, vivid like a fever dream.

The "extras" on the DVD consisted of a rambling narrative by David Lynch. It was black and white, with a big, old-fashioned microphone the only prop at first. Then he started talking into a speaker phone with the disembodied voice of a woman who worked on the film. It seemed like Lynch did anything to avoid revealing the secrets of the movie. The one thing he did say was that no critic has ever come up with an interpretation that matched his own. Oh--and the Girl in the Radiator was not in the original script.

"In Heaven, everything is fine," sings the Girl in the Radiator.

Is it?