Eraserhead

I am a huge David Lynch fan. Blue Velvet is one of my all-time favorite movies. I managed to come across his first film Eraserhead in the library. Thank god I didn't pay for it...financially. It's freaking weird. Lynch himself said the film "was left to the individual's interpretation". I take that to mean he did a butt load of Acid and weed while writing the script.

We have the misfortune of following Harry Spencer, who is a printer that's on vacation. No, that has nothing to do with the "story", but it was heavily mentioned. He visits his girlfriend, Mary, and her family. During dinner, her father cuts into a chicken that starts spurting what looks like blood and her mother appears to have an orgasm. Once again, no rhyme or reason. Just her mother making orgasm faces for a minute. Then Mary's mother tries to make out with Harry, changes her mind and explains that Mary gave birth to Harry's child very prematurely.

Mary is then forced to marry Harry, and moves in with him. We then see the baby. Well, what's supposed to be a baby. I don't know what the hell to compare that thing to. All I know is it freaks me out and I don't want to think about it anymore. It refuses to eat and just wails nonstop. Mary loses her mind and leaves, leaving Harry to determine how to care for the "baby". And in one of the most unsettling scenes ever, the baby gets sick and is somehow covered in pus, sores and has maggots in its mouth.

Believe it or not, here's where things really go off the deep end. It goes from some resemblance of a story to random images and sequences. There's a girl with a disfigured face that supposedly lives in Harry's radiator. He has sex with the neighborhood slut. There's one scene where his head just pops off, spews blood and then the baby's head replaces his. His head then falls through a pool of blood, gets picked up by a little boy and his brain his sold to make pencil erasers. After 20 minutes of...whatever you want to call all of that, we find out all of that was a dream sequence.

Harry opens the door to see the slut getting ready to bang some dude in the hallway. The "baby" begins to laugh in a taunting manner. Harry unwraps the "baby's" bandages, and it's internal organs spill out. So Harry stabs the organs with scissors. Then the film just cuts to him embracing the lady in his radiator.

I don't know what I saw. I'm all for abstract or artsy stuff, but this must be what schizophrenics see. It might be open to interpretation, but how the bloody hell am I supposed to interpret that? Don't have premarital sex or else you'll have a deformed child? People live in radiators and will be your only companion in life? I'm just so confused and very itchy. I don't like it when a movie makes me itchy. I have to give this a goose egg. If you're going for symbolism, make sure the symbolism actually represents something. And if you're weird enough to want to see a freaky artsy Acid trip, look for Rampo Noir.