Description Todd Mc Gowan launches a provocative exploration of weirdness and fantasy in David Lynch\'s groundbreaking oeuvre.
About the Author Todd Mc Gowan is associate professor of English at the University of Vermont..
By using Lynch\'s weirdness as a point of departure, Mc Gowan adds a new dimension to the field of auteur studies and reveals Lynch to be the source of a new and radical conception of fantasy.
Mc Gowan engages with theorists from the "golden age" of film studies (Christian Metz, Laura Mulvey, and Jean-Louis Baudry) and with the thought of Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, and Hegel.
Each chapter discusses the idea of impossibility in one of Lynch\'s films, including the critically acclaimed Blue Velvet and The Elephant Man; the densely plotted Lost Highway and Mulholland Drive; the cult favorite Eraserhead; and the commercially unsuccessful Dune.
Considering the filmmaker\'s entire career, Mc Gowan examines Lynch\'s play with fantasy and traces the political, cultural, and existential impact of his unique style.
Hollywood is often criticized for distorting reality and providing escapist fantasies, but in Lynch\'s movies, fantasy becomes a means through which the viewer is encouraged to build a revolutionary relationship with the world.
He studies Lynch\'s talent for blending the bizarre and the normal to emphasize the odd nature of normality itself.
Description Todd Mc Gowan launches a provocative exploration of weirdness and fantasy in David Lynch\'s groundbreaking oeuvre
