Twin Peaks, David Lynch, 1990

The often undefinable quirk that sets Twin Peaks apart as a uniquely striking piece of media in the "Lynchian" cinematic sphere of influence lies in its visual simplicity. I've talked about this before though one of the most masterful traits an artist can develop throughout their career is the ability to reduce without losing the dramatics. Lynch has an affection for knowing exactly how long to let the moments of unease in works such as Blue Velvet, Mulholland Drive, and Twin Peaks linger without insulting the audience's attention span. He isn't interested in rushing judgment of how a scene will play out to appease an ideal emotional release. This ideology in filmmaking is due at least in part to the era in which Lynch produced much of his media. There's something of a dilemma or fallacy in how we interpret media as being everlasting yet watching Twin Peaks in our current age of instant gratification is a fundamentally different experience than what it felt like to watch in the early 90s. The show hasn't physically changed since 1991 yet despite that we've outlived the initial interpretations. To speak on another director whose work emphasized a similar if not more deeply rooted aesthetic based on the lack of conventional plot and action was that of Andrei Tarkovsky. Both Tarkovsky and Lynch take an interest in giving the audience breathing room to consider their own lives concerning the imagery presented in their films. Lynch might pan over a character engaged in a mundane activity for what seems like a pointlessly long period, he isn't asking the audience to pay rigid attention to the scene at hand but inviting them to re-examine their own environments. Creating without needing an audience reaction or to prescribe a reaction is increasingly lost. In Tarkovsky's book "Sculpting in Time" he writes that, "The dominant, all-powerful factor of the film image is rhythm, expressing the course of time within the frame." For me, some of the most impactful imagery in Twin Peaks are the transitionary periods. Lingering on dangling phone cords, empty hallways, and billboards on the side of lonely roads; the absence of action is tantalizing. In regards to art and life, we shouldn't constantly feel the need to rush to understand the world around us.