contemporary monkey

Finally, a reason to like a film by David Lynch, the American film writer and director.  In all of his films, the strangeness of people and their stories is magnetic, but in the end, the appreciation evaporates into common voyeurism.  Good fun watching mysterious characters do creepy things.  I always thought it was a bit inventive to the point that, the point was to invent odd people, and thus become odd yourself.  Sort of like Paris Hilton being famous for being famous.

David Lynch's new project, The Interview Project

Through a site called new-art.blogspot.com, I’ve learned of Lynch’s new endeavor called The Interview Project, which provides for better storytelling than any of his previous films.  The concept is pretty straight forward: get a camera, turn it on, ask people to sum up their lives so far.  The start line is the statistical hottest place in the USA: Needles, California.  That’s hot as in ambient temperature, not hot as in Michael Jackson popularity (-ness).  I haven’t any idea what the eventual journey is supposed to look like, but given its starting line, and the comments made from average folk, this could be a look back on just how America handled its pot of gold rush to anywhere-but-here on the old Route 66.  America’s elevator pitch, as they say in sales circles.

To Lynch, it appears just any old person will do as a subject, although so far it’s older white males.  Still, the comments could come from anybody with a past.  The writing, because there isn’t any, is better than anything from Hollywood.  The soul-exposing honesty revealed throughout makes for curious entertainment, not to mention a good dose of American tragedy in these days of slow death by General Motors.  Though, maybe it’s a human thing, not peculiar to any country.  America is, and has been the chemistry lab for The Next Big Thing, and travelers from around the world have attempted to make it large in the country’s 230 some odd years of existence.  These stories could be the tragedy of the human being to venture into the wild for understanding and personal purpose.  The scientist’s conclusion to an unsettling experiment.

The length of interviews is easily consumed – about five minutes in length.  Whatever you’re doing throughout the day, you’d have a difficult time finding anything better that delivers a refreshing outlook to life. You think you’ve got it bad, try listening to the stories of the other amoebae in the test tube.

http://interviewproject.davidlynch.com