Canceled after two years, Twin Peaks was revisited in feature-length form by co-creator David Lynch. Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me explored the life of Laura Palmer, chronicling her descent into a personal hell and charting the events that would lead to her death, a moment that opened the show’s pilot. Unrestrained by television censorship laws, Fire Walk with Me was a darker, more twisted venture into the eponymous small town where Lynch let loose his vision of cruelty and heartbreak.
A new video essay by Scout Tafoya, the latest in his The Unloved series, dives into this vision — along with notes on Lynch’s career overall — paying particular attention to his stripping-down of American society’s facade and Fire Walk with Me’s raw, unrelenting, disturbed approach that contributes to this objective.
The essay posits that Lynch answers none of the questions posed by the show, a statement that is only partially true: while no answers are given in terms of the continuing chronology, Fire Walk with Me fills in many gaps about Laura Palmers psyche, life, relationships, and eventual demise. Still, it is an insightful and well-constructed study of what may be Lynch’s most deranged, unhinged work.
As we await the return of Twin Peaks, see the essay below, with a nod to RogerEbert.com.