Why does this scare me?
It’s an odd question when you think it aloud, isn’t it? Mainly cause so much horror we receive is, for the most part – for better or worse-, obvious. Not a bad thing, really. Generally, most storytellers try their best to tap into common fears and use that to their advantage in making you squirm. So it’s no wonder why watching an ax embed into a person’s skull makes you squirm. Or seeing someone buried alive is enough to get you panting for breath. But it’s those few times when a movie gets so deep into you that you can’t figure out why. What’s more, have you ever thought to answer it? For a while, I always figured if I tried to dissect the why of such an answer it ran the risk of sucking the magic out of it. But I’ve realized that with getting older, there comes the desire to learn more about myself. What makes me tick. Why I do the things I do. Why I like the things I do. And maybe most importantly, what scares me? And why? Fingers crossed I can get to the bottom of it.
Why do I like this?
Like most people with most pieces of art, I know exactly why I dislike things. I can tell you without a moments hesitation why this scene dragged. Why this performance could’ve been better. But where I fail, is coming to grips with why I like things. I’m certain that I do, I’m passionate that I do, but barring a few lackluster terms such as:
“Well this part was pretty cool.” Or, “That action scene was super frenetic and visceral.” Or – as is the case with today’s topic – “That part was just really friggin scary.”
I don’t know what it says about me, or about most people, where the negative is so readily accessible in our minds that we can jump on it and critique – sometimes with such viscousness, given the day or mood – but given our recent times, that form of thinking has been leaving me feeling empty and quite frankly a bit depressed. So that’s why I wanna change.
Now, will this happen overnight? Of course not. Hell, if in the next six months there was any true progress, color me shocked, but hey, everyone’s gotta start somewhere, right? And for me, I figured, where better to begin than with a movie that has baffled and terrified me since I was twelve years old: MULHOLLAND DRIVE.
Or one scene in particular. It’s been talked about and studied to death. The infamous Diner scene. Even thinking about it now, thirty and with a thicker skin to scare, I still get chills, so you can imagine how fried it made my twelve-year-old brain. So much so, that once the scene was done, I didn’t even finish the movie for at least another five years when I could muster up the courage.
There was something about this scene that was wrong. Vile in a way that wasn’t so readily apparent. There was no gore, no blood, no nothing, and yet I still felt upset and dirty. Why? How? I was reminded of my parents recounting the first time they saw THE EXORCIST back in the seventies and how they felt they’d seen an actual work of evil. People fainting in the audience and friends of theirs feeling they needed therapy or a confession at church. Thing is, given my parent’s catholic upbringing, it made complete sense what scared them about moments in that movie, same as it did me when I saw it.
What affected me so about MULHOLLAND DRIVE? How did it creep into my skin like some kind of disease?
Along with that, hopefully, I wanna try and dissect the idea of what Lynch is doing in this scene and what so many others have done before him to varying degrees. The jump scare. What makes it so effective and what makes this scene stand out, in my opinion, from the pack.
I guess I should probably stop dawdling and just get on with what the scene actually is, shouldn’t I? Then let’s get to it.
THE SCENE:
As I’ve stated, as is the case of most, if not all of David Lynch’s works, the scene itself starts off simple enough.
Two men, Dan and Herb, are sitting at a diner booth, eating breakfast, when Dan – who’s not eating so much and clearly afraid – recounts a dream that he’s been having for some time now. In it, he’s seated at the same Diner, with the same companion (Herb), and wouldn’t you know it, it’s the exact same time of day as it is now. Herb, in the dream, is clearly scared, which makes Dan, in the dream, even more scared. Why? Cause, as Dan tells it:
And he’s brought Herb here, this day, to try and shake this gnawing feeling of dread. Hearing this, Herb – being maybe the best bro ever – agrees to help without another word. But, as he gets up to pay for breakfast – best bro, like I said – Dan notices something:
The dream is coming to life. Even though we haven’t seen it, in a way, the writing convinced us that we have. A sort of deja vu falls over us. A little later, Herb and Dan step outside, hesitant, and slowly make their way toward the back of the diner, Dan, much to his chagrin, forced in the lead. We follow, tracking nothing but bare cracked walls and piss streaked pavement. Up ahead comes a corner leading out toward an adjacent alleyway. THE CORNER. The very place where Dans dream told him that man would be.
The corner gets closer….
And then…
Seeing this, Dan yells, he falls back, he’s dead. Simple as that. End of scene.
IMPENDING DOOM
Before we dive forward, follow me a step back. 1942 to be exact. CAT PEOPLE, directed by Jacques Tourneur and produced by Val LEWTON, introduced the world – debatably – to the worlds first jump scare. Some have argued PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1925) may hold that crown, but if PHANTOM laid the rocky foundation -lacking the oomph of any sound – Cat People is the first to successfully build off of it in an impactful way.
Now even if you haven’t had the pleasure of seeing CAT PEOPLE, you’ve still seen The LEWTON BUS. Or at the very least variations on it.
What these movies play at is that feeling of the unknown. Is this person going to get killed? Or will it be just a cat springing out from a drawer? It’s that uncertainty that can be fun but after being played on repeat for decades became tired. Became too samey. Audiences grew far savvier to a movies tricks. Horror movies turned into these cinematic rollercoasters, where same as the ride itself the world goes quiet just before the dip. Generally, in horror, there would be a sudden and deliberate vanishing of music. The creaks would grow louder, the pretty actor/actresses breath more pronounced. And with that, unfortunately, it gave you a moment to brace yourself, thus nullifying any sort of tension.
Now I can’t say that David Lynch went into writing and crafting this scene with these thoughts in mind. Yet, in watching his Diner scene it in many ways is not too dissimilar to the feelings one would have in some run-of-the-mill slasher or CAT PEOPLE. In both types of film, the writing and the filmmaking are in essence walking you through the horror with a series of familiar cues. But where most movies fail is to elicit any sort of guttural reaction that Lynch manages to do, seemingly with little effort.
Why is that? Well, as I stated earlier, most horror deals with the idea of uncertainty. What will happen? Who will I see in that dark room? What will I see? The difference here being that Lynch takes all those questions and answers them. From the very start there isn’t much uncertainty but in fact nothing but certainty. As Dan says in his little monologue. “There’s a man doing this.” It’s a Lynch film, so of course, there are vagaries in the overall narrative but in this scene not so much. He tells us straight up, there is a bad man here and when Dan walks out of those doors and down that alley, he will see him and do a bad thing. The rest is simply a ticking clock of when.
David Lynch is not playing with you here. There is danger. People will be hurt and people are, in more than one sadistic way, which is exactly the power of the scene. He’s not only walking you to jump scare, he’s forcing you to the cliffs edge before chucking you right off.
There is no glee to it either. Whereas most horror delivers its thrill with a sly grin, one can’t help but get the sense that as Lynch drags you over toward the inevitable, kicking and screaming all the while, his face illicits something cold and stoic. This must be done, so it will be done.
A note before continuing. As stated previously, there have been, and always will be, people who would no doubt scoff at my ridiculous claims of Mulholland Drive being no more than a horror movie. And they’re absolutely right. From a certain point of view, the film, as most of his Lynches work, could be categorized as hardcore dramas. Deep tragedies of spirit. Whether it be the abuse Laura Palmer suffers at the hand of her father in FIRE WALK WITH ME, or the harsh anxiety of new fatherhood heaped upon the shoulders of Henry Spencer in ERASERHEAD. Past that darkness, there is, in fact, a light which weaves an all too human tale. In some ways, I do agree with that sentiment, and yet I’d also argue, and this is in no way me trying to be a contrarian, but that is exactly why it screams horror to me.
There’s a unifying factor to the genre and one that Lynch has perfected in his stories all through his career: tragedy. Films slicked over with death, tears and screams, it’s not hard to see. It’s one of the very things that stuck out to me when watching Mulholland Drive as well as his other works and what stuck out to me stayed with me for so long. People are people in his stories, whether we know them for a moment or we know them for a few short minutes. The fear is real because they are. And more than making me scared, which it certainly did, it made me sad. It’s that sadness that grabs hold and lends itself to the fear.
Perhaps time is a factor in it as well. Maybe the reason for my hate at 12 was simply because at that age our lives are nothing but uncertainty. The good kind. What will the future bring? Will I be successful at what I want? Will I even know what I want? Same as those cheap jump scares, that fifty-fifty chance on whether or not doom lays around the corner is just enough to eek out a bit of safety in one’s mind and give a breath. You can rest comfortably in the knowledge that maybe, just maybe, you’ll be ok. Sure, sometimes you roll the dice and aren’t that lucky, but same as there are a plethora of people to kill in some slasher, there’s an abundance of time at your feet when younger. You’ll make it. You have to. You’re certain in your uncertainty.
But nothings faster than life, is it? Nothing’s more certain that that clock has suddenly shifted and seems to be growing quicker, doesn’t it? Inevitability. Doom. “The mans doing it.” He’s right outside waiting and you have to go out and meet him. Nowadays, there doesn’t seem to be as many chances. Your abundance of luck is limited it seems to a few paltry plays of the dice. Now did I understand this at 12? Maybe not consciously, no. Yet, similar to so many characters in a Lynchian world who’re given glimpses of something, be it the future or some horrifying dreamscape, that they may not understand but they know it’s there and they will one day have to meet it, perhaps I too, through this scene, got a glimpse of how inevitable it would all become.
Now I also don’t think David Lynch crafted this scene to traumatize 12-year-olds and give them a crash course on life. At least I’m pretty sure that isn’t the case. I think simply, as in most of his works, he thrusts you, same as the character, into the dark, and instead of allowing you purchase after two hours for a spot of light, there he leaves you.
In Closing…
Here’s hoping this isn’t a one-off and I keep allowing myself and the movies I’ve loved and that have affected me, the time and concentration they, and I, require of study.
Now, do I get MULHOLLAND DRIVE?! Nope. And believe you me, I’ve tried my best, thinking cap pulled tight over my head, ready to learn and nothing, still as baffled as ever. But even if a movie or book or play or whatever is baffling, A.) Doesn’t mean it can’t be enjoyed and B.) Doesn’t mean you can’t figure out what exactly YOU get from it.
It’s been said a whole lot, so I’m saying nothing new here, but we’re complicated. Us. People. It’s hard to get a grasp on others but it’s sometimes even harder to get a grasp on ourselves and that can be a real tragedy. Trust me, there’s been many a time where I thought to just give up and drink in media of all sorts like a brain dead zombie. If any synapse in my head went off, I ignored it, left it wanting and thirst by the way side, longing for study. For so long, I failed to understand myself and I’m afraid it made me grow jaded and nasty. Maybe there was a sense of envy, jealousy, as I saw others around me able to articulate their thoughts so clearly and put in the time that I was far too lazy to do so. I hope this is sort of a step in the right direction.
And I guess for anyone else, as much as I wanted to analyze MULHOLLAND DRIVE, I guess this here is what’s known as Trojan horsing. Using well-articulated scripting analysis as more of a journal. But, I guess that tracks, being a writer and all. That’s what we all do, hold up one hand and promise this here is the story an audience is going to receive and then, sneakily with our other hand sneak in that personal stuff. That stuff, that if kept inside any longer, will drive you beyond mad. I’d go out on a limb and say the same applies to David Lynch and this scene.
On the one hand, it’s about a demon hobo scaring a man to death and on the other…it’s about acceptance. My words not David Lynches. Reluctant acceptance but acceptance nevertheless. We’re all gonna have to walk out of that diner and head down that alleyway one day or another. At the very least, when do so, despite that inevitability that awaits us, we can at least learn to be content with ourselves.
I really do hope I am by then.
