David Lynch's seminal horror masterpiece released in 1976. His first full-length film, made over 5 years on a budget of a mere $10,000. The surreal atmosphere the film creates is one of dark, grainy industrial noise. To date, it is the greatest atmosphere that I have ever seen created for the screen. Shot in a bleak black and white, the film contains little dialogue but nonetheless remains extremely captivating and intriguing. The quasi-apocalyptical/ industrial setting gives a feeling of distance and discomfort while a continuous soundtrack of noise and the sound of space (expertly crafted by Lynch and Alan R. Splet) further adds to an almost nauseating sense of lonliness and isolation. Admittedly, it is not for everyone. As all of Lynch's films it takes quite a while to get into and get your head around. But it pays off in the end.
The movie tells the story of Henry, played with a wild-haired, staring-eyed, almost autistic quality by John Nance. It is obvious from the beginning he is somewhat socially inept. He lives in a squalid bed-sitting room, and has a marginal relationship with a skinny, hysterical girl whose family, human rejects living in an urban wasteland, alternate between total passivity and a violent mania that borders on epilepsy. When he finally has dinner with her family a very tense feeling is exuded. As he starts to carve the scrawny bird for dinner, it starts kicking, oozing blood and squealing unnervingly like a baby, and the girl's family fall into hysterics. It is revealed the girl is pregnant and the parent's force her to move in with him.
However, the baby turns out to be a mutant, mewling horror - quite unnervingly convincing - that looks like a skinned rabbit and howls and cries incessantly, like a dying animal. It is tightly wrapped, like a mummy, in swaddling clothes. The girl cannot tolerate the baby and leaves, leaving it in the care of the profusely-haired Henry. Industrial noises permeate the room. The central images are of slime and ooze and small, wriggling things. Henry drifts through this nightmare trying to care for the child. He has a dream where his head falls off and is processed into erasers for the end of pencils. As he gazes into the radiator a pallid chubby-cheeked vaudeville girl emerges to dance, squashing foetus-like worms as she does so, with a delighted yet innocent grin. The baby falls sick and Henry nurses it. Then, ultimately fed-up, he begins to cut open its swaddling clothes with scissors. The bandages turn out to be part of its body, which bursts open revealing a grotesque squirm of entrails that begin to foam and fill the room. A miniature apocalypse ensues.
Although Lynch always remains very incommuncative about his films, Eraserhead reveals personal fears of his own fatherhood. The freak baby and the relation he has with it was based on the birth of his own daughter Jennifer. The film also deals with the human being's fear of being used as a cog in some greater machine, as witnessed in Henry's nightmare of being manufactured into pencil erasers.
This film is definitely an experience best viewed with high-quality sound and picture in order to convey in the best possible way the great atmosphere and the sense of nausea and isolation it creates.
Cast:
- John "Jack" Nance : Henry Spencer
- Charlotte Stewart : Mary X
- Allen Joseph : Bill X
- Jeanne Bates : Mrs X
- Judith Anna Roberts : beautiful neighbour
- Jack Fisk : Man from another Planet
- Laurel Near : Lady in the Radiator
- Jean Lange : Grandmother
- Thomas Coulson : The Boy
- John Monez : Vagrant
- Neil Moran : Boss
- Darwin Johnston : Paul
- Hal Landon Jr. : Pencil machine operator
Shot in 35mm black and white.
In my humble opinion, this and Mulholland Drive are Lynch's best films (although I have not yet seen Blue Velvet, so don't listen to me).